Home
Background
Artists
Events
Supporters
Join us
Links

Refugee Week 2002

I Dream of a Window

Parvaneh Soltani

Theatre director, actress and film critic, from Iran. 

Artform
Parvaneh has been involved in theatre for many years. She has taught, acted and directed in mainstream and fringe theatre. She was a member of the Iranian Theatre Society in Tehran.

Her main subject for her own work is the life and plight of Iranian women. She uses comedy. She works both in Farsi and in English.

Parvaneh's adaptation of Dario Fo's Women Alone has been performed twice in London, and toured to several cities in Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands. It will soon be shown at a theatre festival in France.

Journey
Parvaneh came to London as a refugee from Iran in 1985.

Since then she has continued to direct and act extensively, but only in plays she herself has produced. She formed the Nina Theatre Company in London, mostly working with Iranian women. Her main subject is the plight of Iranian women. 

She has also written and directed a documentary A passion for life, and is writing a feature film.

Parvaneh is a regular contributor to the Iran Bulletin, published in English, and Women's Voice, published in Sweden. She writes about theatre, film, visual art, and women. Some of her articles have been republished in New Left Review.

Artists in Exile
Artists in Exile is full of artists who are not just talented but professional. We have all been alone … as a group we can do a lot.

On Tuesday 26th June 2001, the Riverside Studios will show Parvaneh's performance in Farsi of A Woman Alone. The protagonist is a housewife who has everything in the bosom of her family except the most important thing: the right to be treated by the men of the house as an individual and respected as such, not used only as a sexual object and an unsalaried servant.

For further details, please email: artistsinexile@tantraweb.co.uk