M Gallery, CICA Museum
April 2 – 6, 2025
2025.4.2 – 4.6
The City Gone Missing
A city is more than its architecture—it is the people who move through it, shape it, and give it life. But what happens when they disappear? In The City Gone Missing, I explore the absence of people—their departure, their erasure, the voids they leave behind. Through video art and paintings, I trace the lingering presence of those who are no longer here, whether lost to migration, displacement, or forces unseen. This work is not only about loss but also about memory and resilience. Shadows remain where bodies once stood, sounds persist in the streets, and movements of the past resonate in the the present. How do we remember those who are gone? How do we carry the weight of the missing ? By layering images, movement, and light, I seek to visualize both what is present and absent. The missing leave scars beneath the surface. The City Gone Missing is an act of witnessing, a reflection on those who have been displaced, forgotten, or erased. In their absence, we search for traces, for proof that they were here, and for the stories they left behind.
Parisa Shabani is always fascinated by the human person and her story. Rooted in her past of diverse and tumultuous life, her work discovers faint traces of the lived experience of perpetual overcoming as analytic elements to be represented in interactive synthesis with current sociopolitical realities, in an abstract form. Shabani has showed in New York City and internationally. She has had several solo shows in New York City, Tehran and Gimpo, South Korea. She participated in different art biennales and International art fairs including in London, Florence and Tokyo. Her work has been exhibited in various group shows worldwide and has appeared in several publications including as book covers for books published in Baku, Azerbaijan and Istanbul, Turkiye. She is a New York-based interdisciplinary artist originally from Tehran. She earned her MA in Linguistics and has studied painting and sculpture at The Art Students League of New York where she now is a life member. Her last solo show titled “Life Unraveled” has been exhibited at A.I.R Gallery in Brooklyn, New York in 2024.
