Shirin Neshat is revered as the foremost visual artist addressing the social, political, and psychological dimensions of women's experience in contemporary Islamic societies. The present image is a still from her film Women Without Men, a cinematic interpretation of Shahrnush Parsipuher's 1990 magical realist novel. The film won the Silver Lion at the 2009 Venice Biennale. The work follows four women living in a charged pre-Islamic revolution moment in Persia on a path of both personal and political transformation. Within each scene, Neshat references her own photographs or famous paintings. 
 
Shirin Neshat (b.1957) has won numerous accolades for her work, including the First International Prize at the 48th Venice Biennale (1999), the Infinity Award for Visual Art from the International Center for Photography, New York (2002), and she was an honoree at The First Annual Risk Takers in the Arts Celebration, given by The Sundance Institute, New York (2003). Her work has been exhibited throughout the world and can be seen in the public collections at the Tate Britain, London, England; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY; The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL; IAC - Institut d'art contemporain Villeurbanne/Rhône-Alpes, Villeurbanne, France; and the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv, Israel. Neshat lives and works in New York City.