Artists Stage Protest for Mahsa Amini at the Guggenheim

Twelve bright red ribbons were hung from the top level of the Guggenheim’s rotunda on Saturday, October 22, covered with black stencils depicting the face of Mahsa Amini and the words ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ repeated in both English and Kurdish. Amini was a young woman killed on September 16 at the hands of Iran’s “morality police” for refusing to wear a hijab according to government standards. The group of artists responsible for the protest, the Anonymous Art Collective for Iran, explained in a statement that they took this opportunity to call attention to and demand action regarding ‘the current revolution in Iran.’

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The Manhattan museum was bustling with locals and tourists who cheered and clapped as the banners descended. Many posted the event on social media in support of the women’s rights movement in Iran, rendering the protest a part of a global reality beyond the walls of the prestigious institution. 

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The artists’ choice of the Guggenheim for the protest was not random. To experts in the arts and curious tourists alike, the museum signifies cultural value. It provides a context of and for great art, with both its exhibits and its architecture. As a symbol of the contemporary art-viewing experience, the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed rotunda emphasizes the role of modern art in demanding and creating change. The powerful image of red banners hanging like a shredded curtain against the renowned white spiraling stories of the museum demands that the consequences of the bloody Iranian revolution be confronted on a global and institutional level—by institutions as distanced from that reality as the Guggenheim. The Collective responsible created art and displayed it in an iconic artistic context, but not in an attempt to attribute aesthetic value to their protest. Their installation was part of an effort to create an interactive experience that mobilizes the Guggenheim’s value as a locus of worthy change as well as the power of art to touch the human soul. 

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This was not the first time the Guggenheim was used as a place for protest. Earlier this year, activists flew paper planes through the atrium calling for a no-fly zone over Ukraine. In 2019, PAIN (Prescription Addiction Intervention Now) put up banners and staged a die-in to denounce the museum’s affiliation with the Sackler family of Purdue Pharma. Protesters see the museum as a space that has the power to attract global attention and imbue their protests with the value of modern art. In the case of the Amini protest, the hanging of the banners was not meant to be seen as a mere demonstration of disapproval, but as a performance of the resurrection of Mahsa Amini’s memory through art.

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