What does safety look like in a gathering of talismans and protection? Of the Majlis al-Jinn; of the monstrous; of the othered; of and with humans and more-than-humans. What can we learn from this commitment to queering? Is it possible to sense a distancing and be-longing both at once? [Survival] guilt and joy on a diasporic dance floor? How and when would one know which emotions are the more sacred?

Top image: installation view of Allahyari’s The Queer Withdrawings and Qareen I and Qareen II (“constant companions”), in the exhibition Rave Into the Future: Art In Motion.

Morehshin Allahyari

Bay Area-based Iranian-Kurdish artist, whose work weaves together complex narratives in opposition to the ongoing influence of Western technological colonialism in the context of the Middle East and North Africa.

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