Elham Rokni at Dvir Gallery

Artist: Elham Rokni

Exhibition title: If One Day

Venue: Dvir Gallery, Tel Aviv, Israel

Date: January 22 – February 26, 2021

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Dvir Gallery

This exhibition is based on The Crying Man project, which is being presented for the first time as a multi-channel installation.
In this project, Rokni photographs her father crying every year to the song of Iranian singer Pramerz Aslani’s If One Day. Rokni engages emotional manipulations towards her father thus examining their relationship while raising issues of immigration, masculinity and aging.

The Crying Man consists of fifteen videos taken between the years 2007-2022 in different places (home, garden, studio, car, shop, museum, gallery)

If One Day
Lyrics and composition by Paramarz Aslani

if one day you would go away leave me suddenly
unaware, in despair
I’ll fall into reverie

I’ll be lonely, once more very
I’ll tell the night to stay with me
I’ll tell the dawn to sing me a song to sing me of where my love is and that how could she leave me leave me lonely like this

if you would take away
take away your warmth from me
I’ll turn into a sea bird
I’ll embrace the waves
I’ll tell my heart to say no more
yet I’ll leave in uproar
so that everyone knows
and I’ll go there
where you wouldn’t leave me anymore

if one day your name again would ring in my ear again would bring me the pain
would have me in chains again I’ll tell my heart fear not

to let your pain a lot
lot deeper into my heart
so that i could sing
sing you ever and ever when we part

if you would take away
take away your warmth from me I’ll turn into a sea bird
I’ll embrace the waves
I’ll tell my heart to say no more yet I’ll leave in uproar.

Special thanks to Daniel Meir and Almog Barzilai 2021 – singer: Morin Nehedar, piano: Orel Oshrat

Elham Rokni, If One Day, 2022, exhibition view, Dvir Gallery, Tel Aviv. The Crying Man, 2022, 15 channels video installation, loop, variable dimensions