”What a Revolutionary Must Know” weaves a powerful narrative of displacement and survival.
The Contemporary Arts Center’s newest exhibition, Sheida Soleimani: What a Revolutionary Must Know, features the Iranian-American artist’s Ghostwriter series—a collection of photos, sculptures, and video that deconstruct her parents’ escape from the totalitarian regime of Iran.
Having opened October 18, the exhibition is the multimedia artist’s first solo museum show in the U.S. The gallery is transformed into an immersive space with constructed sets and visual metaphors that represent the personal stories of Soleimani’s parents as refugees and confronts issues of identity, memory, and political trauma. Striking imagery evokes sentiments of urgency, immediacy, and survival.
Soleimani is a multimedia artist, UC DAAP alum, and an associate professor of studio art at Brandeis University. She has permanent collections at the Guggenheim Museum, Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, MIT’s List Visual Arts Center, Kadist Paris, and the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.
“It’s a sort of homecoming for Sheida,” says Theresa Bembnister, curator of the exhibition. Although Soleimani was raised in the suburbs of Loveland, her parents fled from Iran in 1979, and their journey is especially resonant throughout the work in Ghostwriter. Images of her parents appear within her sets alongside wall murals of drawings that her mother created.
“These sets are also windows into the relationship between the artist and her parents,” says Bembnister, adding that Ghostwriter is based on the idea that Soleimani is “ghostwriting” her parents’ story and life in the United States. The exhibition has multiple parts, and one of the crucial elements is that Soleimani transformed the gallery into a life-size game of Snakes and Ladders—a game based on chance that serves as a broader metaphor for the risks political refugees face when fleeing their homeland.
It features wall murals depicting the border between Turkey and Iran, a guard house positioned along the country lines, and directional signs that guide visitors along a road leading toward the mountains. Game board pieces scattered throughout the space reinforce this metaphor, while recurring references to snakes and snakeskins further emphasize the theme of uncertainty and peril in the journey toward freedom. For the first time, Solemani displays a video installation that captures conversations between herself and her parents, who now live outside of Albuquerque—a simple, back-and-forth exchange about their memories and current life.
Soleimani’s work also serves to personalize the political, says Bembnister. “We are all connected globally as well as politically … Her family’s story is a global one.” Using her visual language, Sheida reveals how political displacement resonates across borders, transforming personal narratives into universal ones. By taking the visual metaphors seen in her photographs and translating them into three dimensions, such as with the game board pieces, the artist invites viewers to quite literally walk through the game itself. This transformation not only redefines the experience of viewing her photographs but also immerses visitors in the precarious and uncertain journey the works represent.
“Sheida Soleimani: What a Revolutionary Must Know” will be on view at the Contemporary Art Center through January 25, 2026.
