Portrait Photographs from Isfahan: Faces in Transition, 1920–1950

The establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979 meant women were forced to wear the hijab, and photographs of them uncovered were forbidden. As a result, many photographers studios were burnt to the ground, while remaining archives of invaluable glass-plate negatives were left to moulder in attics.Parisa Damandan spent over ten years accumulating an impressive collection of pioneering early twentieth-century photographs from her hometown of Isfahan. Recently emancipated women posing in various state of dress; Polish war refugees on their tortuous journey home after fleeing the Nazis; men in fashionable hats or in traditional turbans and cloaks – these portraits offer a remarkable window on the changing face of Iranian society during a period of transition from a traditional to a modern culture.Alongside these stunning images are essays on the development of portraiture in Isfahan, the social dimensions of portrait photography in Iran and the power of the gaze.