This Image Led to a Photographer Being Sentenced to 74 Lashes in Iran

This hanging portrait of an Iranian singer in a black costume, her hair uncovered, has come at a devastating price for the photographer who captured it — leading to a sentence of 74 lashes, a journey ban, and a prohibition on inventive exercise.

Tahmineh Monzavi is an acclaimed Iranian documentary photographer who has had her work exhibited in museums the world over. Monzavi’s work focuses on ladies and marginalized communities within the Iranian capital of Tehran.

In December 2024, Monzavi photographed and filmed a live performance by Iranian singer Parastoo Ahmadi, who is thought within the nation’s dissident circles. During the efficiency, which was livestreamed on Ahmadi’s YouTube channel, the singer carried out the patriotic music Az Khoone Javanane Vatan (From the Blood of the Youth of the Homeland) with out sporting a hijab. Monzavi’s pictures from the live performance included the picture (above) that was later exhibited at Photo London.

The live performance shortly went viral on YouTube, and Ahmadi was briefly detained and charged alongside a number of musicians shortly after its launch, earlier than being freed. However, according to a report by The New World, Monzavi has now additionally been charged by Iranian authorities over filming and photographing the efficiency.

The New World reviews that Monzavi, together with different members of the manufacturing crew, has been accused of “offending public decency” and the publication of vulgar and immoral “content online.” For the offence of taking pictures, Monzavi has now been detained, given a two-year journey ban, a two-year restriction on “artistic activity” and sentenced to be viciously flogged with 74 lashes. The punishment is carried out with a three-foot whip, and the ache is reportedly so intense that some victims lose consciousness after only some strikes.

‘No One Can Separate Me From Photography’

In 2012, Monzavi was previously arrested and imprisoned after her pictures of drug customers and intercourse staff in poorer areas of Tehran have been deemed “dangerous to society” by Iranian authorities. She spent a month in solitary confinement, and the expertise was so traumatic that she stated she misplaced her “courage as a documentary photographer” and stepped away from her work for 2 years.

But Monzavi tells The New World that images stays a robust manner for her to specific what she and others in Iran are experiencing.

“No one can separate me from photography. I want people to understand what we are feeling,” she says. “You know, many people, many young girls, paid their blood for us. They didn’t think that they would be killed in the street. It is a horrible, horrible business but their spirit will survive. They are strong.”

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Image creditAll images by Tahmineh Monzavi.