Sholeh Asgary

From March 10-June 10, the 2027 @furthertriennial will celebrate Northern California’s creative and cultural life, bringing together more than 80 arts organizations across the Greater Bay Area. At Root Division, artist @SholehAsgary will present Tahrir, a new site-specific sonic installation that evokes sirens of war and wails of lamentation. Tahrir is organized by @PJPolicarpio . #FurtherTriennial2027 #NorthernCalifornia #RootDivision #PJPolicarpio #SholehAsgary

update: SOLD OUT! ✨ last 1️⃣ copy of @sholehasgary ’s cassette Aban on smingsming.com ❕👀 ❕ via @48hillssf : “Asgary’s voice emerges from the ether, snakes across the stereo field, and dissipates. A santur, an Iranian hammered dulcimer, flutters plaintively like a stray hummingbird. A siren becomes strings; a voice becomes an insect whine; doors open and close in the distance.” digital albums will still be available via @sholehasgary / @crystalline_morphologies bandcamp + streaming platforms. 📸 (3-5): @sholehasgary performance @estuario.la earlier this year. photos by @estuario.la

Yalda: ending the dark reign of empire, birthing the light of resistance ‎شب يلدا •‎ Yalda is an ancient tradition  marking the winter solstice. It is observed from central to southwest asia to the caucasus. This event sees Yalda as a metaphor for bringing an end to the dark reign of racial capitalism worldwide and inviting the birth of light and revolutionary change. We will be in community while honoring the grief over two years of genocide and destruction in Gهzه, Sudan, the ongoing violence of ICE raids and rise of fascist governments attacking the safety and livelihood of queer and trans people. The event is an immersive and introspective experience as well as a community gathering around art and nourishment to shape new ways of observing cultural traditions. In the same way that we evoke Hafez to receive wisdom from his ghazals, we read the histories, prose and poems of abolitionist, anti-imperialist feminist thinkers. We will honor the roots of this ancient tradition while grounded in the context of present day struggles for liberation and the history of revolutionary ancestors.  More info and tickets: https://magicsnail.club/Yalda_25.html Programming: electro-acoustic performances and DJ sets to carry the pulse of the evening. Tea and ash-reshteh, limited-edition riso prints and cassettes for sale, Hafez poems/faals, and altar. Live Performances: @sholehasgary @kimiakoochakzadeh DJs: @omjvinyls @alchemia__ Afghan & Iranian songs of resistance tapes: @falgoush Flyer: @anniekwonart Event webpage: Scheherazade (magicsnail.club) Thank you for hosting us @coneshapetop Tickets: $15-25 sliding scale, NOTAFLOF. All proceeds will be donated to grassroots mutual aid initiatives in Sudan Access: The venue has an indoor and outdoor space. The inside portion is on the ground floor while the majority of the backyard is elevated and requires stairs. The live performances will take place in the elevated part of the backyard which is not wheelchair accessible. Masking is recommended and extra masks are provided. The bathroom is not ADA accessible. Thank you to loved ones who helped make this possible🤍

Root Division is thrilled to share that we are a recipient of Further Triennial’s Community Impact Fund Grant. This grant will provide essential support towards our participation in the Triennial’s first edition, Around Here, which will bring together nearly 100 arts organizations across the Greater Bay Area to celebrate Northern California’s creative life. In Spring of 2027, Root Division will present Tahrir, a site-specific sonic installation by Bay Area–based Iranian artist @SholehAsgary and curated by @PJPolicarpio . In Arabic and Farsi, tahrir means “freedom” and refers to a Persian vocal technique marked by oscillating pitch shifts shaped by both sound and silence. Asgary translates this tradition into a spatial experience using a calibrated network of industrial fans scored to produce shifting tonal frequencies that evoke sirens, breath, and lamentation. At a moment of intensified global conflict, this project offers Bay Area audiences an urgently needed space for collective reckoning and reflection through contemporary art. We look forward to celebrating Northern California’s vibrant art historical past and present with you! @furthertriennial #FurtherTriennial

in partnership with @crystalline_morphologies , we’re releasing a second edition of @sholehasgary ’s electro-acoustic album آبـان (Aban)—this time sporting a handstamped cover in black, ruins of a temple dedicated to Anahita, goddess of the Waters, in iran. described by Daniel Bromfield in @48hillssf : “Sholeh Asgary’s metamorphic ‘آبـان (Aban)’ slips from the haze of dreams … [this] engrossing first album is full of insects, sirens, santur, and ghostly flickers of her voice.” now available via smingsming.com or on @sholehasgary ’s bandcamp! shipping out this wknd~ 🦗🦗 link in bio.

Outsider Sounds and Visions Fest is a two day music festival in West Oakland March 27 and 28, 2026 celebrating the twenty year anniversary of @ratskinrecords happening at First Church Of The Buzzard in West Oakland featuring over thirty five bands / performances. Presale ticket link in our bio. There will be a livestream version in mid April, as opposed to during the event as we want to ensure the best quality and most accessible streaming version we can! Artist Spotlight: SHOLEH ASGARY We’re honored to welcome Sholeh Asgary into the Ratskin Records Outsider Sounds and Visions Festival. Sholeh’s work moves with intention—blurring memory, sound, and place into something deeply felt and quietly and LOUDLY powerful. Sholeh’s work contains a care and presence that invites us to slow down, to listen more closely, and to sit with the spaces between this chaotic and breaking world. SHOLEH’s work is second to none and we could not be humbled more to have her as part of OSAV Fest. Absolutely not to be missed. Word is she may have a few copies of her last album on cassette for sale - very limited!! Highly recommended! Sholeh Asgary (b. Iran) engages performance, interdisciplinary forms, and collective processes to investigate, memorialize, and express the complexities of joy and survival inherent in diasporic and refugee experiences. Her work challenges colonial assumptions about what is heard, proposing new futures through sound. #sholehasgary #ratskinrecords #osavfest #oaklandmusicfestival

One year ago, the day after Nowruz together, @leilaabdulrauf and I performed for the first time as a duo at @thelabsf . We chanted to Anahita and naturally, our songs revolved around death, resilience, war, smashing the patriarchy, and loss from a place of deep love. It was a great honor to open up for @tartarelena and I joked that we were the darkside of the night - forever 🖤🖤

Written by one of the strongest women I know, Shokoufeh Sakhi on International Women’s Day, 2026. Shokoufeh Sakhi is a former prisoner of conscience who suffered imprisonment for eight years under the regime of the Ayatollahs in Iran during the 1980s. Dr. Sakhi acted as Executive Committee Director (2013-2014) of the Iran Tribunal Foundation investigating the Iranian state’s crimes against humanity in the 1980s. She also testified as an ex-political prisoner at the Iranian People’s Tribunal hearings held at the Hague (2012).

Please join us this evening for the closing performance and letter writing workshop of “Love Letter to Aliens“ curated by @sholehasgary . Flying Over Walls @flyingoverwalls is a Queer/Trans Prisoner Solidarity Project in the SF Bay Area and will be hosting a prisoner letter writing workshop this evening starting at 5:30 PM. Roco Cordova @roco.cordova who opened the exhibition with a performance in October will be guiding us to the closure of this portal with a performance titled “standing on the earth beneath our feet” beginning at 6:30 PM tonight. Thank you to Zachary James Watkins who will be on the audio board and our new ED, Julio Cesar Morales for alien mocktails and cocktails!

New Review: Upon entering Southern Exposure’s exhibition Love Letters to Aliens, visitors are greeted by a graphic visualization of the show's title. An organic cluster of neon-green concentric circles, like digital tree rings, floats within a slick black rectangle, subsumed by a wall of ornate text. The text takes the form of a letter from the show’s curator, artist Sholeh Asgary, addressed to the group of artists featured in the exhibition: Rana Hamadeh, Xandra Ibarra, Osvaldo Ramirez Castillo, Maryam Tafakory, and Yue Xiang. Asgary’s words precipitate an exploration of “how intimately and vastly we occupy time and space when edges meet,” prompting both the show's artists and audience to consider “what is a border but the beginning or ending of things?”- Sienna Freeman @southernexposuresf (Southern Exposure / SoEx). @sholehasgary (curator/artist Sholeh Asgary). @lachicaboom (Xandra Ibarra). @osvaldoramirezcastillo (Osvaldo Ramirez Castillo). @maryamtafakory (Maryam Tafakory). @xiangyuecreates (Yue Xiang – the account SoEx tags for the exhibition). @rana.hmadeh (Rana Hamadeh). @roco.cordova (closing performance by Roco Córdova). @alchemia__ (DJ set by Alchemia; appears to be private). @minoosh_z (photography credit: Minoosh Zomorodinia). @filmvidumbrella (Film and Video Umbrella; support credit for Nazarbazi). @siennafreeman (writer Sienna Freeman). #LoveLettersToAliens #RoborantReview #SouthernExposure #SoEx #ArtReview #ContemporaryArt #BayAreaArt #SanFranciscoArt

Love Letters to Aliens | Closing Reception Saturday, February 7, 2026 5:00-8:00 PM 5:00 PM - Doors Open 5:30 PM - Letter Writing Workshop with Flying Over Walls 6:30 PM - Standing On The Earth Beneath Our Feet Performance by Roco Córdova As the exhibition Love Letters to Aliens comes to a close amidst national uprising and terrifying acts of state-enacted violence, we invite our community to come together again in honor of the many artists transgressing borders in their work, lives, and bodies. The evening will begin with a letter-writing workshop, reaching out to incarcerated queer and trans individuals, in collaboration with our event partners Flying Over Walls. After, join us for a performance by Roco Córdova of Standing On The Earth Beneath Our Feet. Finally, enjoy drinks, art, and community that fosters belonging for all of us aliens. Flyer designed by Curator of “Love Letters to Aliens,” Sholeh Asgary

Thank you so much to our community for joining us in the gallery earlier this month as we celebrated the launch of Niloufar Khonsari’s transformative book “The Future is Collective.” We had a blast with Niloufar @niloukhonsari , “Love Letters to Aliens” curator Sholeh Asgary @sholehasgary , and experimental musician and arts administrator Sharmi Basu @vitalartsorg . If you couldn’t make it, get your copy of “The Future is Collective” today at the link in our bio or at your local bookstore. We love Medicine for Nightmares @medicinefornightmares ! This event is a part of a larger exhibition “Love Letter to Aliens,” which closes on February 7. Be sure to check out the artwork on view before it’s too late.