Screening of The Ink of Identity: Rereading Afghanistan

Saturday, March 16 
2:00 - 4:00 p.m.
Free and open to the public

Join 2022 Artist in Residence Gazelle Samizay for a screening of the video work from her multimedia installation The Ink of Identity: Rereading Afghanistan!

Emerging from Samizay's desire to critically engage with and disrupt prevailing narratives in the SFPL's extensive collection of books on Afghanistan (dating back to 1762), this exhibition explored the complexities of Afghan identity and the impact of Western-authored literature on the understanding of Afghan history and culture, with a particular focus on Afghan American perspectives. 

As part of her process, Samizay presented select library books to Afghan Americans, prompting responses and reflections via video. The material, some of which was unfamiliar to the interviewees, sparked questions about their own identities and lineages and often times the sharing of intimate personal and familial stories. The conversations captured a sense of distance from their homeland, not only geographically but also temporally, as the interviewees explored aspects of Afghanistan that have been lost over time.

Following the screening, Samizay will be in conversation with author and interviewee Tamim Ansary. 

About the panelists

Born in Kabul, Afghanistan and raised in rural Washington state, Gazelle Samizay’s work often reflects the complexities and contradictions of culture, nationality and gender through the lens of her bicultural identity. Her work in photography, video, and mixed media has been exhibited across the US and internationally, including at Whitechapel Gallery, London; Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery; the California Museum of Photography, Riverside; the de Young Museum, San Francisco; the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, and the Slamdance Film Festival, Park City, UT. Her pieces are part of the permanent collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Center for Photography at Woodstock, NY; and En Foco, NY. In addition to her studio practice, her writing has been published in One Story, Thirty Stories: An Anthology of Contemporary Afghan American Literature, and she is vice president of the board of the Afghan American Artists and Writers Association. Samizay has received numerous awards and residencies, including from the Princess Grace Foundation, NY; Craft Contemporary, Los Angeles; the Arizona Community Foundation, Phoenix; Level Ground, Los Angeles, the Torrance Art Museum, Los Angeles; the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, NY; and the San Francisco Arts Commission. She has been featured in the Los Angeles Times, NPR, Hyperallergic, LA Weekly, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and Contemporary Practices. She received her MFA in photography at the University of Arizona and currently lives in San Francisco where she serves as the gallery director of the Worth Ryder Art Gallery at UC Berkeley. www.gazellesamizay.com

Tamim Ansary is an Afghan American author who grew up in Afghanistan and grew old in America. His books include West of Kabul, East of New York, a memoir, chosen by San Francisco as its One City One Book pick for 2008, and Games Without Rules, a history of Afghanistan from the inside looking out. The Widow's Husband,  which he wrote with support from a SF Arts Commission grant, is set in Afghanistan during the first Anglo-Afghan war. Ansary ran the San Francisco Writer Workshop for 22 years and lectures occasionally at the Osher Institute, at U.C. Berkeley. www.mirtamimansary.com