DAVID GIBSON WRITING

The paintings that fill Roya Farassat’s solo exhibition “A Mirror with Two Faces” present a variety of symbolic portraits that reflect the repressive social conditions in her homeland of Iran and the psychological repercussions that have resulted from them. What begins as a form of social critique gives way to a pantheon of ciphers and phantoms that are iconic and pathetic, expressive and opaque. We can view them alternately as a reflection of ourselves, or of a world in which we do not belong. Though they at first seem to resemble one another, subtle differences emerge from these images, which in their degree of symbolism are similar to ghost portraits popular during the Victorian era, or effigies constructed to perform rituals of vengeance. They are small in scale, creating an intimate viewing experience, like looking at family photographs. In truth, we are observing one large aspect of the psychological family of man, in which the various states of emotional existence are