Aghigh Afkhami
MFA ’25 Photography
Gallery Assistant
Ecdysis is the act of shedding. It is a moment of growing pain marked by suffering and extreme vulnerability while resisting becomes bold unconsciously. In this project, ecdysis becomes a metaphor for a psychological rupture: a slow, painful transformation in which the self is no longer recognizable to itself, and surroundings and memories merge, dissolving into nothingness.
The work emerges from a prolonged state of absence, distance, and loss. It traces the moment when the human mind begins to slip—when the thin boundary between existing and not existing collapses. Time stretches, attachment erodes, and consciousness fragments. What remains is not clarity, but endurance: continued existence paired with an escalating sense of madness.
As the project unfolds, the images degrade. They become increasingly grainy, unstable, and barely photographic, yet existing as photographs. This visual erosion mirrors the internal collapse of perception, where reality becomes paralyzed and truth merges with illusions and paranoia. Rage, confusion, and attachment seep into the surface of the image.
The artist’s vision in this project is about the act of staying alive while shedding a former self—exposed, unprotected, and unsure whether what remains can still be called identity or reality.
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Aghigh Afkhami (b. 1996, Tehran; based in Boston) is a multidisciplinary artist working with photography, video, and bookmaking. Her practice explores memory, resilience, and fragmentation through narrative and sequencing. She holds an MFA in Photography from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. Afkhami’s photobooks Salakhi (2024, with Amir Esfandiari) and Stress (2024) have been presented at international art book fairs including Miss Read (Berlin) and the LA Art Book Fair (Los Angeles). Her work has been exhibited in Iran, the United States, and the UAE, and she was a finalist in the 19th Arte Laguna Prize (Venice).
