Maryam Taghavi is an artist and educator. She was born in Tehran and currently resides in Chicago. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Emily Carr University and Master of Fine Arts from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she received The New Artist Society Scholarship.
Taghavi’s work on language and abstraction in recent years has coalesced with research on Islamic occult practices. More specifically, the branch of Simyia, which is the practice of making sigils, or spells by arrangements of Arabic letters and numbers. In reincarnation of these sigils, within a range of disciplines such as painting, drawing, sculpture, performance, publication, and installation, she intends to release the movement withheld in these forms. Unlike the traditional hierarchies of the belief system, the female agency conjures magic and steers the imagined invisible.
She has exhibited nationally and internationally at institutions such as LAXART, Queens Museum, Exterressa Museum, Chicago Cultural Center, EXPO, Driehaus Museum, Chicago Artists Coalition, The University Club, and Sazmanab Gallery among others. She is the recipient of the 2022 Artadia award. In 2023 her work will be installed permanently at the O’Hare airport and she will have a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art.
