Amy Khoshbin: Redefining Art, Politics, and Their Intersectionality

VOTE AMY KHOSHBIN: CITY COUNCIL DISTRICT 39

Amy Khoshbin is running for City Council in District 39 of Brooklyn in the Fall 2017 Race. According to her website, "Khoshbin is running as an information-gathering strategy, to demystify the supposedly complex structures of government and to empower others to run for office." Reviewing her official page, she is presented as a very common politician who wants to tackle trendy issues:

• Prioritize a culture that supports creativity -- "we all start as creative individuals when we're children"
• Put Brooklyn citizens before politics and corporate interests
• Empower Brooklyn citizens with skills to create their own livelihoods and not be completely dependent on a corporate system
• Dismantle all white supremacist systems
• Ensure Brooklyn is a safe space for immigrants
• Value Brooklynites -- their skills, talents, and insights -- to help strengthen the economic, social, cultural, and environmental state of Brooklyn
• "Build a future we want to see, together"

What separates Khoshbin from other traditional politicians is her extensive background in art. Khoshbin is "an Iranian-American Brooklyn-based artist merging performance, video, collage, costume and sound to examine our individual and collective compulsion to create, transform, and sometimes destroy the stories of who we are and who we think we should be. She produces media and mythologies using humor and a handmade aesthetic to throw a counterpunch at the high-definition, profit-generating codes and signals that American audiences are trained and accustomed to consuming." 

Recently, her work was featured in the exhibition Archival Alchemy: South Asian Women's Creative Collection, located at Abrons Art Center. Her piece, entitled Scheherazade Project (2017), is a multimedia project that "merges live performance and an original score with animated Persian illustrations, images from the Iranian Revolution, found and newly created film footage, and immersive video game tropes to explore the power of storytelling, past and present."

There has not been a politician, in recent years, that frequently engages with communities through the means of art. If Amy Khoshbin's campaign is a success, she could redefine the relationship art and politics continue to endure. She has the potential to construct innovative methods to interact with individuals within the community and within the government: as a result, the bridge between politicians and the people could be gapped. 

For more information about Amy Khoshbin: http://tinyscissors.com
To view more of her work: https://vimeo.com/semiotech
To view The Scheherazade Project: https://vimeo.com/198574125