Group Exhibition | "Selective Lobotomy": Dastan's Basement

Dastan's Basement presents "Selective Lobotomy", a group exhibition curated by Saam Keshmiri. Bringing together photographs and videos by Alfred Yaghoubzadeh, Kaveh Kazemi, Maryam Kazemzadeh, Alborz Kazemi, Shayan Sajadian, Sina Shiri, Maryam Takhtkeshian, Maryam Rahmanian, and Hashem Shakeri, the exhibition opens on Friday, July 17, and will remain on view until August 7, 2026.
"Selective Lobotomy" examines two defining moments in Iran's recent history: the Iran-Iraq War, and the recent the recent war.
Although separated by time and shaped by different political, historical, and media contexts, these two wars remain relatively close in historical perspective. Yet they occupy markedly different places in collective memory. For many, the Iran-Iraq War has gradually receded into a distant or forgotten past, while the recent conflict, for various reasons, has been experienced more tangibly and immediately in everyday life. These differences have shaped not only how the two events are remembered, but also how they have been documented and narrated.
Rather than approaching these historical moments through political or ideological frameworks, Selective Lobotomy places them alongside one another through the lens of lived human experience. The exhibition brings together works by photographers from two generations, each with distinct backgrounds and artistic approaches. Some of the works document war directly, while others move beyond the frontlines to consider its impact on everyday life, social relationships, and the surrounding environment.
Together, they present a range of narratives that extend from the moment of conflict to its lasting effects on society.
The exhibition's installation is conceived around this same premise. Images and videos are projected onto twelve large sheets of paper suspended from ceiling to floor. As visitors move through the space, the hanging screens shift, causing the projected images to distort and fragment. At the same time, each viewer's shadow inevitably obscures portions of the projections, preventing them from being seen in full. The experience of viewing is therefore always partial, unstable, and shaped by the presence of others. This condition evokes the mechanisms of memory itself, with its selective tendency to emphasize certain images while pushing others to the margins or erasing them altogether.
Alongside this broader framework, the exhibition offers an opportunity to encounter different approaches to documenting crisis.
Works by Kaveh Kazemi, Maryam Kazemzadeh, and Alfred Yaghobzadeh provide direct photographic accounts of the Iran-Irag War, each shaped by a distinct perspective and position. Among them, Maryam Kazemzadeh's photographs offer a particularly nuanced and sensitive engagement with the human experience of war.
By contrast, the works of the younger generation focus less on the event of war itself than on its enduring impact on society and everyday life. Presented together, the photographs of Kaveh and Alborz Kazemi, father and son, offer an intergenerational perspective on the documentation of conflict. While Kaveh Kazemi's work centers on recording the event itself, Alborz Kazemi turns toward the social spaces where the effects of crisis continue to unfold in indirect yet profound ways, from rap music communities to the lived experiences of younger generations. Shayan Sajadian directs his attention to overlooked segments of society and vulnerable communities, while Hashem Shakeri follows a community of female skateboarders navigating everyday life under changing conditions. Sina Shiri documents the experience of displacement, migration, and leaving one's city in the wake of war. Across these works, war is approached not simply as military conflict, but as a force that reshapes personal identities, social relations, and the conditions of everyday life.