In 2019, mixed media artist Shiva Shoeybi teamed up with documentary filmmaker Monica Mak to create a gallery exhibition exploring insider, outsider, and liminal perspectives on the hijab.
Together, they are The Hair Scarf Collective.
They raise questions about those who wear, and about those who cast judgment upon those who do. What are our assumptions? Misconceptions? Where does freedom of choice come in?
The duo’s present work, The Hair Scarf Digital, adapts the gallery exhibition into the digital realm.
No longer limited to a physical space, this online exhibition weaves fabric-based art with documentary video, photography, 3D modelling, and social media.
Their goal? To reflect on internal versus external constructions of female appearance, and to experience the interplay between the tactile and the digital, the private and the public.