Solo Exhibition

Nordic Black Theatre, Oslo, Norway – 5/24 May, 2025

Arian Nowbahari opened his solo exhibition Un-Born, featuring an artist presentation and the screening of the short film Twelve Minutes, produced by New Spring Productions™.

Rooted in themes of identity, migration, and emotion beyond language, Un-Born explores women’s lived experiences through painting and film. Through a personal and expressive lens, Nowbahari reflects on femininity, memory, and silence, drawing inspiration from Norwegian artists such as Astri Welhaven Heiberg.

The evening opened with a live presentation on the artistic influences and motivations behind the exhibition, followed by the screening of Twelve Minutes. Like the paintings, the film examines the intersection of women’s rights and immigration, focusing on emotional tension rather than explicit depiction.

Un-Born invites audiences to reflect not only on what is visible, but on what remains unspoken, unseen, and perhaps never born.

The exhibition is curated by Sarah Rezayat.

My painting explores the threshold between the outer world and inner emotions, capturing the fragile space between existence and becoming.

Each piece is an introspection tool, not a fixed image but a process—like a camera that records fleeting impressions rather than a photograph that preserves them.

Painting, for me, is an act of discovery.
It is the momentary glimpse into an abyss of emotions—melancholy, resilience, hope, and loss—before they dissolve.
The observer, in turn, activates the work. The act of looking is a shutter release, merging memory and perception into a new
reality.

Un-Born embodies this transitory state. It is about what persists in uncertainty—unspoken words, unborn possibilities, emotions not yet
fulfilled, and wounds that have not yet healed.

Inspired by neo-expressionism, my work uses strong contrasts and fluid forms to navigate themes of womanhood, migration, and the feelings we often suppress because they make us too alive.

This exhibition does not seek answers but invites reflection on what remains in between—on what is yet to be.

Arian Nowbahari