This is an audio transcript of the FT Weekend podcast episode: Performer Shirin Neshat on the particular women-led protests in Serbia
Lilah Raptopoulos
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[MUSIC PLAYING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
Since protests began in Usa four weeks ago, the particular artist Shirin Neshat has been glued to her phone.
Shirin Neshat
We think for most of us living outside of Iran, all of us pretty much expected that we will go very likely the rest of our lives within the state that will we are. Maybe things will go up and down a little in Iran, but we’ll never go back. And then came this day and this news, plus we thought, oh, well, this is just another short uprising the last a few days or the week. And now it’s like we are entering the fourth week, the particular longest uprising we’ve had since the Iranian revolution in 1979. Plus the people of Iran are furious.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Shirin lives in the US She has since the 1970s. But over the last 30 years, she’s become one of the most esteemed, well-known artists making work about Iranian women in the world. And women are leading the current protests. Mostly really young women. The protests started after the death of 22 year old Mahsa Amini. Mahsa had been detained by Iran’s morality police for allegedly not properly observing the particular hijab, and she died in their custody. But her dying sparked action that’s grown far beyond a call for justice for Mahsa’s family plus beyond fighting for the laws around women’s dress.
Shirin Neshat
It sort of unleashed a kind of rage that was brewing in people’s heart and lives. And it was almost as if they were having to wait for a martyr or someone who symbolised their own struggles.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Today, Shirin gives us context for that protests in Serbia. We furthermore talk about the girl expansive body of function. Shirin will be a multimedia artist. She came in order to fame with a series in the nineties called Women associated with Allah. This month, within support of the protests, Shirin offers allowed some of these images to be projected on buildings across central London and Los Angeles. Then we all turn to drug research and speak to two FT journalists who have been covering an encouraging trend. It turns out that we can now grow entire mini organs in a lab and then test upon them. That could mean cutting way down on animal testing while making more advances in medicine. This is usually FT Weekend break. I’m Lilah Raptopoulos.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
Given that Mahsa’s loss of life on September 16th, protests have been growing across Usa.
[AUDIO CLIP OF PEOPLE SHOUTING IN NON-ENGLISH LANGUAGE]
Lilah Raptopoulos
The situation has gotten violent. According to rights groups, 185 people, including 19 minors, happen to be killed as of this past Tuesday. Yet beyond the particular big demonstrations, protests seem to be happening everywhere, especially among young women.
[AUDIO CLIP OF PROTESTS PLAYING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
You may have seen videos on social media of high school girls giving photos of Iran’s supreme leader the middle finger…
[AUDIO CLIP OF GIRLS SHOUTING IN NON-ENGLISH LANGUAGE]
Lilah Raptopoulos
… or even waving their particular headscarves within the air, chasing officials out of their school, shouting, ‘Shame on you. ’ Acts associated with incredible bravery in the country that mandates what women wear and what they do. When I spoke in order to Shirin last weekend, I wanted to understand how the ladies of Iran had gotten here.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Shirin, welcome. Thank you so much for being on the show.
Shirin Neshat
Thank you for having me.
Lilah Raptopoulos
I would love to talk about the particular themes of your work in relation to the protests happening in Serbia. But first, I actually wanted to ask you if a person could walk us through what’s been happening there. We know the particular protests had been kicked off by the passing away of a young woman named Mahsa Amini. But I’d like to hear how you might describe exactly what has happened since.
Shirin Neshat
Yes. Ironically, as you and I speak right now, there is perhaps the biggest protest happening in the streets of Tehran today, Saturday, October eighth. And there’s a scenes of massacre going on in the roads. And my sister just left me a message from Iran that is total chaos on the streets of Tehran.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Really.
Shirin Neshat
Yeah. It doesn’t feel like simply another kind of protest or a passing violent uprising, but it is really starting to look like a revolution and I am shaking as I talk with you. The government is just going all the way inside retaliation plus the people are not giving up. So there is a scene of war all over the country.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. Shirin So much associated with your work is focused on females and women’s bodies, and this protest is definitely against the particular mandatory hijab, maybe on the surface, but it seems to represent so a lot more. I’m wondering if you can tell us what people are fighting for.
Shirin Neshat
Indeed. I mean, just talking specifically about what I have tried in order to do in the work. It’s been actually to look at how historically only in the country of Iran, not all across the Islamic globe, the female body provides been such a contested space and each time there is a change associated with the governments, the whole situation for the woman changes completely. You know, it came in 1925 during Reza Shah. Reza Shah Pahlavi’s father, where his mandate was to move Iran away from a religious society, toward a more modern and progressive society. So therefore, it was illegal for the woman to step out within the public domain with the hijab. Ten years later, by the particular time the woman became very cosmopolitan and of course, some individuals remained religious. Then arrived the trend more than three decades ago plus came with Khomeini hijacking that will revolution and soon after this was mandatory for the women in order to wear the particular veil. And that basically has become the image of the Islamic Republic associated with Iran. The particular identity because if the women unveiled, you know, their entire image as a government would certainly fail and that’s why they would not possibly relax even somewhat the rules.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Yes. How does that translate into your work?
Shirin Neshat
I mean, I’ve never really already been after anything other than framing the particular questions due to the fact I’ve in no way been interested in criticising people who are spiritual or not really religious, but simply saying this is an incredible phenomena, exactly how a woman’s body can be, you understand, is certainly in such dispute. After which you see today the woman of Iran is saying, enough, enough is enough. Keep your religion and ideology from our body. And the men are supporting the particular women.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Are you surprised that these protest came from women, that they erupted around the sort associated with women’s autonomy or…
Shirin Neshat
You know, we’ve had a lot of uprisings in the past 43 years, people really confronting the government for your economic reasons, unemployment, unfair election, lack of water. But it’s really amazing that the time which is concentrated on women, it’s not stopping. It is like, yeah, always in my work I possess said that the particular women of Iran, yes, they’re against the war plus they’re truly oppressed, yet they’re not really losers. They’re defiant, they’re resilient, rebellious, they’re fighters. And so, no, I am not surprised because since all I’ve been saying all this time [laughter], that women associated with Iran are usually fearless regardless of generation. Can I add that what’s really, really remarkable is the youngest woman in the age of teenager through 12 to 17 are the most intelligent, the most articulate. We get goosebumps when I speak about it.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, it is really interesting to listen to you say that. A person kind of weren’t expecting this in order to continue and also that you’re not amazed that it’s these women. I guess what is it regarding the young protesters that will feels different to you? Do they feel different?
Shirin Neshat
I think the level of anger and trend that is embedded inside of them, you understand, imagine if you’re seven years old and you were told you have to wear the hijab. I actually mean, what kind of life will be that? You’re just a child. Imagine when you are forced to be educated inside a particular education that is purely Islamic. You know, imagine, a person know, that you can’t still walk down the street with your own friends freely. I mean, I just find that they’re being so violated for their own basic rights. And, you know, it is hard for you and We to imagine sitting in the West, a person know, we don’t experience this much violence, this particular much oppression, day after day right after day.
Lilah Raptopoulos
I should say here that Shirin was born and raised in Usa, but the Iranian revolution occurred while she was studying in America. Therefore she didn’t return with regard to close to 20 years. After her first trip back in 1990, she started building art. Shirin was officially banned from Iran within 1996, therefore she’s an artist looking at her home from the outside in. And a lot of the themes in the girl work are usually about that: longing, reconciling her Iranian identity along with Western expectations. But tons of Shirin’s work also addresses the particular politics associated with Iran directly. One piece I love that feels very relevant to this current movement is a video installation called Turbulent . This won the 1998 Venice Biennial prize.
[AUDIO CLIP OF PEOPLE SHOUTING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
The video starts with the very traditional male Iranian singer singing to a very appreciative, conventional male Iranian audience.
[AUDIO CLIP OF A MALE IRANIAN SINGING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
But halfway through this switches in order to an Iranian woman singing to a good empty room.
[AUDIO CLIP OF A FEMALE IRANIAN SINGING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
Iranian law forbids women through public performance. So this woman’s song naturally defies the particular rules. And after that it starts to upend all of them. It becomes almost nonsensical.
[AUDIO CLIP TRANSITIONS TO A FEMALE IRANIAN SINGING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
Until it builds to something unbearable. You can feel it in your bones.
[AUDIO CLIP OF GUTTURAL NOISE]
Lilah Raptopoulos
I watched it again and was just yesterday and has been so moved by it. Maybe you can explain this.
Shirin Neshat
Yes. On the surface area, it was actually about how ladies ever since the Islamic Revolution were deprived of the encounter of public performance music. They were never allowed. As well as the men are. But once it came to her turn, it had been without any tie to language. It has been a guttural. And when the girl started to sing, her songs became an expression of rage and anger. And even through so many different emotions. It became a type of a protest. And, you know, it had been one of the function that, you know, I actually didn’t have to explain something. The whole world understood that you are you got, you understand, the particular woman who is alienated anyone in the world who’s more pushed against the particular wall. There’s more chances that they are reacting more tougher.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, absolutely. And I observe kind of there’s this pain of not being heard. You understand, whenever you’re watching these protests and viewing women showing their hair plus teenagers standing up to the morality law enforcement. And there is also this particular feeling to me of such as, we have got nothing in order to lose.
Shirin Neshat
That’s right. The price of freedom. Plus but look at what they are doing. This could potentially be the first revolution made by woman ever within the history of mankind. Isn’t that will remarkable? And maybe as all of us taste and sadly, we’re losing a lot associated with people and a lot of young ones. My heart aches plus I just want to say, stop, please don’t. Let’s not really see any more bloodshed. But the more there’s bloodshed, the more it appears like that’s igniting the fire in people.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Shirin, can I ask, what are you working on now?
Shirin Neshat
And my latest work is about how, for example , the woman body consistently has been a good object of desire, but objects the violation and violence. You know, it’s really odd, ironic that I shot a video plus working upon photographs given that last spring which is about women that become sexually assaulted, particularly as political activists in Iranian prisons. It emerged to me personally after We listened to many, many trials of interrogators who finally had to confess towards the way that they were murdering political prisoners, but especially raped and sexually assaulted women. And these women plus consequently the lot associated with them committed suicide because they never were able to recover, even if they had been freed. So my most recent video is usually about a woman who basically was freed and able to come to the United States yet never was able in order to cope with reality with life again.
Lilah Raptopoulos
That new work will be exhibited at the Gladstone Gallery within New York this January. There are so many performers like Shirin who’ve been making art that feeds into the particular protest movement and there have also been individuals posting artwork inspired simply by the motion and those artists are playing a really special role. It’s dangerous for this movement to have leaders, but posting art on social media is a way to give it momentum. Before I actually let Shirin go, I needed to ask her regarding one really prominent example of that.
[‘BARAYE’ BY SHERVIN HAJIPOUR PLAYING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
It’s the song known as “Baraye” by Shervin Hajipour, and it’s become the anthem of this movement.
Lilah Raptopoulos
The lyrics are based on tweets from people across Iran explaining why they’ve come out to protest. ‘Baraye’ means ‘for’ or ‘because of. ’ So the particular lyrics include things like ‘because associated with the fear of kissing a loved one’ and ‘for the sunrise after the long, dark nights. ’
[‘BARAYE’ BY SHERVIN HAJIPOUR PLAYING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
Shervin was arrested for posting “Baraye” yet has considering that been released.
Lilah Raptopoulos
I’m curious if you could tell me the little bit about it and your reflections of this. Like there is something about it that makes clear that art plus music are very important in order to protests want this.
Shirin Neshat
Yeah, well, I have to explain that will first of all, Shervin Hajipour’s song, the lyrics, his voice. It kind of sort of wrapped all our recent history in Iran, all the pain and grief and the suffering associated with Iranian people. Just with those few words, you know, if a person really read the lyrics. So he managed in that short track to touch a nerve in Iranian people from throughout the board. You understand, what I always said in Iran are usually artists come from the coronary heart from the community and they talk about the people, to the particular people. We don’t make slogans. All of us speak plus touch the emotions, all those raw nerve emotions of the individuals. So we are told that we are important in this uprising. How beautiful is that? That will you as artists seem like you actually play an important role and the particular people respect you and really like you. Plus we understand that we are who all of us are because of that. And so we have to give back to them at the time that they’re suffering. And that is it. That is it. There is no way around it.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Shirin, thank you so much regarding joining myself. This was actually an honour.
Shirin Neshat
Thank you so much intended for your period.
[‘BARAYE’ BY SHERVIN HAJIPOUR PLAYING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
I’ve put links to Shirin’s work and the song “Baraye” in the display notes.
[‘BARAYE’ BY SHERVIN HAJIPOUR PLAYING]
Lilah Raptopoulos
We care a lot more than we all used to regarding animals, just how much meat we eat, the way the food industry treats animals, how the cosmetic industry goodies animals. Yet there’s one aspect we really don’t talk that much about where animal testing is definitely still very prevalent — medicine. Take, for example, the rules that will the US Food and Drug Administration still demands to get a drug to market.
Clive Cookson
Because at the moment, I think the particular FDA in the US requires 1 small pet model plus two large animal model tests to get safety. And that’s a lot.
Lilah Raptopoulos
That’s Clive Cookson, the FT’s science editor. And the numbers add up quickly. They are said in order to be close to 100mn animal procedures every year around the particular world. That’s on mice and rats and after that on bigger animals like monkeys and dogs. But here’s some thing that surprised me. Animal testing is actually pretty bad at predicting drug efficacy in humans. So our own global pharma correspondent Hannah Kuchler started looking into it.
Hannah Kuchler
Again and once again I would go and meet scientists working inside drug companies plus they might say, Oh, we possess this terrible process and all these hurdles trying to develop this drug, because with this drug, the animal models aren’t very good. And it would certainly just arrive up again and again. And I was suddenly like are usually animal models good for anything at all?
Lilah Raptopoulos
To give you a sense of just how inaccurate animal testing is, for some cancers, the accuracy is just eight per cent using animals. So in case a drug works or doesn’t on a mouse, there’s just an eight per cent chance that it’ll have got the same effect upon a human. But there’s another way exactly where the accuracy is 80%. It’s a method that uses organs that are grown in a lab. It is pretty incredible. And Clive and Hannah are actually addressing it. Welcome to the particular show. So I invited all of them on to the show. First We needed Clive to explain what exactly we were talking about. Instead associated with animals, scientists are now screening on human tissues that are developed in a lab through embryo stem cells. The particular most exciting kind are called organoids.
Clive Cookson
Organoids are miniature human organs, they’re self-contained and tiny, maybe finger or thumbnail or smaller in size, and these people will reproduce particular internal organs.
Lilah Raptopoulos
So picture a tiny miniature liver or kidney without a human attached to it. If you’re doing tests, a person can notice how a drug affects almost all of its tissue and all of its functioning. Another thing scientists are able in order to do right now that’s really cool is take the lab-grown organ plus then connect it to an electronic circuit that makes the organ act alive. That means you can discover it inside action. You can see how the drug affects it.
Clive Cookson
Then when that will joined together with a micro electronics devices and the fluidics, where you may diffuse the particular drug or even through them and observe what’s heading on. That is often called tissues on a chip or even organs upon a nick.
Lilah Raptopoulos
All of this is a real breakthrough, and it’s possible because associated with advances within genetic engineering. You’re using real human being genetic material, not an animal that might approximate us. Plus you’re observing entire organs in small. You’re holding that small kidney or liver right in front of you.
Clive Cookson
A person can do kind of things to a mouse within the lab, which some listeners might find distasteful. Yet there’s no way of really looking into a living mouse in the exact same way as you can look, notice at these types of human cells in a good organoid or even on a tissue chip.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Wow. Are the pictures incredible associated with that?
Clive Cookson
Yes. Photos of brain organoids in particular, where you find them beginning to develop the shape of a real early individual embryo. And then you can see the brain developing in the embryo. It can be it’s amazing. It’s mind boggling.
Lilah Raptopoulos
But there’s the catch. Plus that catch is that in real life, livers and kidneys are attached with our bodies. And thus when you found a medication that kills liver cancer, but this also poisons your other organs, you’re going to need in order to know that.
Clive Cookson
What’s hard to reproduce is what’s called the entire systemic effect of a drug on a body. In other words, you can make increasingly sophisticated organoids or tissues on the chip, plus you may begin to combine them. Yet if you want to see exactly how it’s affecting a whole body, I’m afraid you have to use an pet. And I actually think that’s going to be, I mean, short of we’re not going to have a sort of miniature whole human such as thing [laughter]…
Lilah Raptopoulos
You never know, Clive, sounds like we’re going there. [laughter]
Lilah Raptopoulos
Here’s where it gets fascinating. These new technologies mean that we may get a lot more and better drugs coming through the early stages associated with testing. We’re capable to test on organoids, which are effective but disembodied, and skip the rodents simply because they do not have great track records anyway. But getting better drugs in order to advance previous those initial trials can actually mean that we’ll have to do more testing on large animals such as pigs and monkeys. And that’s something most people find a lot harder to stomach compared to testing on rats plus mice.
Hannah Kuchler
If your mouse and your rat does not have the same cells or genes, then you can’t test them very well. But it may be that will larger creatures, primates especially, are much closer to people. Therefore perform have individuals cells and genes. And therefore, you end up with this situation to end up using more of these.
Lilah Raptopoulos
But that seems want a bad point. Hannah, right? Like isn’t that this reverse of exactly what we’re trying to do?
Hannah Kuchler
I imply, it is. Yet I believe We think that will it’s another reason why individuals are looking pertaining to these technologies more closely is because they will realize that they can’t simply run through blocks of rats and rats and get the particular right impact. And really even more accurate than tests inside a primate maybe screening on an organoid.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. Plus also like if they’re testing upon more big animals in the medium term, in the short phrase, it also just type of means that like we’re getting better at saving humans, correct? Like we are getting much better at carrying diseases.
Hannah Kuchler
Yes. Which is obviously good, but yeah this raises questions about how exactly we do it plus can all of us just move straight to the particular thing that we think is a lot more accurate…
Lilah Raptopoulos
Right.
Hannah Kuchler
… and bypass the stage exactly where we try and get, you understand, test on more primates.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Clive plus Hannah, I’m curious. You know, I saw at the particular bottom of the piece that will someone had written a letter and these people declared that, a person know, these advances within science and technology are really great. But actually it is important in order to not ignore the ethical questions of animal assessment. I’m interested what you think about it.
Clive Cookson
I actually think the ethical issues are essential. They’re motivating scientists inside drug companies and study labs. Yet we should remember that another ethical issue is the need to get better and much better at improving human health and treating disease. And for that reason, if this particular line of technology, human come cell analysis as well as the internal organs and cells you can make from it, improve pharmaceutical R& D, biological research plus lead to better drugs, you could state that is part associated with the honest imperative meant for doing it.
Lilah Raptopoulos
It’s a really good point.
Hannah Kuchler
Yeah, I agree with Clive and I would say that in fact the ethics are not changing massively. There’s usually going to be that debate between, a person know, how do we want to treat animals and how do we want to improve human health. But what actually interested me during the particular reporting of this piece was, one, those really stark figures that maybe we realise this, you understand, we do this thing that may be considered unethical and this isn’t even that efficient.
Lilah Raptopoulos
Right.
Hannah Kuchler
… and the discovery that actually what I do think is certainly driving the majority of pharma to do this to enhance, you know, their particular success rate plus therefore reduce their costs. And We think that is quite a powerful motivator that will also have a side effect associated with reducing the impact on pets.
Lilah Raptopoulos
OK. Say thanks to you both. We’ll watch this area. Maybe you can come upon again and tell us just how this is developing and am actually appreciate your own time.
Clive Cookson
Thanks, Lilah. Enjoyed it.
Hannah Kuchler
Thank you.
Lilah Raptopoulos
You can read the particular piece that will Hannah plus Clive wrote about this with Joe Miller about FT. com. I’ve link to it in the show notes.
That’s the show this week. Give thanks to you designed for hearing FT Weekend the particular podcast through the Monetary Times. Before we go, we are usually giving you a single last week just for our listener call out. We’re basically challenging you to challenge us all. What will be one thing that you think most individuals would get boring yet we could create interesting on the display? There’s the link within the show information. You just have to tap it and it will bring you to a site where you can leave us a message from whatever device you’re on. It’s really easy. Go ahead over there if you think of something, don’t think too hard about it. We might play it on the show. Next week we are talking about Jane Austen adaptations. I love this conversation. And we’re also speaking about the Boston Marathon. The Boston Marathon has recently added a non-binary gender category for its runners. So we’ll talk about what the particular implications might be on other sports and tournaments if a person want in order to say hi, we like hearing from you. You can email us at [email protected] com. The show is upon Twitter @ftweekendpod, and I’m on Instagram and Twitter @lilahrap. You are able to keep up with the call outs plus behind the scenes stuff from the particular show on my Instagram. Links to everything mentioned today are in the show notes alongside a link to the particular best offers available if you want to take out a subscription to the FT and give it a shot. Those offers are at ft. com/weekendpodcast. Make sure in order to use that link to get the discount. I am Lilah Raptopoulos and here’s my very talented team. Katya Kumkova is our senior producer. Lulu Smith is our own producer. Mollie Nugent is our contributing producer with help this week through producer Persis Love. Our sound engineers are Breen Turner plus Sam Giovinco with original music by Metaphor Music. Topher Forhecz is our executive producer and special thanks go as always to Cheryl Brumley. Have a lovely weekend and we’ll find each other again next week.