Born to a semi-traditional family in one of the most ancient cities in the world with an art and cultural heritage of more than two millennia, the patriarchal environment was imprinted on my life. As an artist, who grew up in a religious country that practiced traditions from ancient times, I was drawn to interdisciplinary lines between different fields, where I believed new knowledge could emerge. I arrived in the United States in 2015 with dreams, like bright stars, guiding me on a journey to pursue a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) at Penn State. The experience of the MFA program not only equipped me with visual research skills but also dramatically illuminated feminine life in two completely different cultures. “World traveling” is the best term to describe what I experience in the U.S. as an immigrant; the term that Maria Lugones (1987), in her essay titled Playfulness, world-traveling, and loving perception, described as a shift from being one person to being a different person; an identity crisis that immigrants deal with within new geographical and cultural contexts and I closely feel it. 

Since entering the doctoral degree program in art education and Women's Gender, and Sexuality Studies (WGSS), my research continues to question the perceptions of women and social inscriptions of identity. Thinking of all my questions and concerns about my identity convinced me that to deeply understand the difficulties and challenges of being an immigrant, I should study other female  Iranian immigrants, and their post-migration lived experiences and stories. My research focuses on the oppression and identity crisis that Iranian women deal with within the United States. I took a feminist arts-based narrative approach to data collection to understand Iranian-born women's stories in the United States who agree to share their narratives. Starting with feminist standpoint theory and analyzing data through transnational intersectionality, I aim to reveal the power structures underlying Iranian women's everyday activities and experiences. The next step in my research is to make their portraitures to enable them to narrate their stories in a way that engages and affects viewers. The AR portrait paintings enable people who would not necessarily read my dissertation to travel to Iranian women's worlds.