Vows to Water An Artistic Exploration of Iranian Ritual and Resilience
MFA Thesis Exhibition Gales Gallery, York University, Toronto April 20–24, 2026
Reimagining Iranian rain-summoning rituals through installation and performance in response to water scarcity and cultural resilience.
Artist Statement
Vows to Water is a research-creation project that investigates the enduring legacy of Iranian rain-summoning rituals and their relevance to today’s ecological crisis. As a descendant of rain-summoners and Mirabs (traditional water guardians) in Iran, I explore how these ancient practices can be reimagined through contemporary art to address collective memory, climate urgency, and cultural resilience.
The exhibition consists of two interconnected elements: a recorded performance and a large-scale installation. Together, they bridge ancestral knowledge with present-day environmental and diasporic experience.
Support & Acknowledgements
This project was generously supported by:
Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship (CGS-M)
CIBC Fine Arts Graduate Student Award
The Installation
Installation The installation features seven abstract human-figure sculptures and one tree, all hand-constructed from sheer cotton fabric. The fabric symbolically references traditional shrouds, evoking fragility, memory, and the human body in a state of vulnerability.
These suspended forms serve as projection surfaces for video imagery of flowing water surfaces. The moving projections drift across the figures and gallery walls, creating an immersive, ever-shifting environment that suggests both absence and the hope of renewal. Viewers are invited to walk among the figures, engaging sensorily with the work and reflecting on water scarcity and cultural continuity.
Performance
The performance re-enacts elements of traditional Iranian rain-summoning rituals, specifically drawing from the “wish tree” (or cloth-tying) tradition. In the recorded work, I tie narrow strips of fabric, painted with images of Iran’s endangered rivers and bodies of water, to a living tree while reciting poetic invocations drawn from ancient Zoroastrian texts, mythic literature, and contemporary reflections on water crisis.
Process: Four Seasons, Four Locations The final recorded performance is a synthesis of four site-specific performances I carried out during artist residencies across Ontario, each in a different season.
Each location brought its own palette, weather, and resonance, highlighting the contrast between Iran’s arid landscapes and the Canadian environment while emphasizing global interdependence of water. These four performances were later woven into a single cohesive recorded work.
https://vimeo.com/1184633517?fl=ip&fe=ec
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