Paper
Mahmoud Maktabi
- Period
- 2017
- Location
- Tehran
Project Overview
Paper was a four-hour performance carried out simultaneously across four different venues in Tehran on November 23, 2017: Hepta Gallery served as the central hub, alongside three private homes. Visitors were free to choose which site to attend. At the heart of the artwork was an intimate, one-on-one conversation across a table between a performer and a visitor. The guest would write a dream onto a sheet of cigarette paper and hand it over to the performer, who rolled it into a functional cigarette. Each encounter ultimately built toward a singular choice — whether that written dream would go up in smoke or be preserved.
Context & Site
The performance occurred across two distinct types of interior spaces: one formal (the gallery) and three informal (private homes). For the artist, this decentralized, multi-site approach was a way to fragment the performance space so that no single audience member or performer would walk away with an identical experience. While a single set of instructions applied across all four locations, the level of intimacy, the direction of the conversations, and the overall dynamic shifted based on the people and the room itself.
By utilizing homes in Seyed Khandan, Ferdowsi Square, and Tehransar, the performance actively incorporated the geographic realities of Tehran. In each home, the hosts selected an existing room without altering it. In the gallery, the setup was stripped down to minimal elements on the tables, with several stations arranged to encourage visitors to disperse throughout the space. The physical environment was deliberately designed so that after the initial interaction, the site itself would not demand further attention, allowing conversation and behavior to remain grounded in a casual, everyday register.
Participation & Process
The performance ran for four hours, unfolding in parallel across all four locations on the same day. At each site, performers sat at tables equipped with cigarette paper and loose tobacco. When a visitor arrived, they wrote a dream on a piece of paper and handed it across the table for the performer to roll. From there, the visitor could read a dream written by the performer, help roll the cigarette, or simply sit and converse without smoking. There were no time limits on these exchanges, nor any cap on how many dreams a person could write.
Visitors navigated this environment in highly personal ways. Some wrote multiple dreams and smoked the resulting cigarettes alongside the performer. Others took the rolled cigarette with them, refusing to let it be lit, while some even declined to let the performer photograph their writing. Across all these variations, the defining element was the unfiltered, direct exchange between two people who were usually complete strangers.
For Maktabi, participation operated on two levels: as form, because the work literally could not exist without the visitor's physical presence, and as content, because what was written on those papers — entirely unprompted and unguided by the artist — became the core identity of the performance. Maktabi also points to a subtler, quieter layer running through the piece: a hidden intervention into the body. Many visitors smoked for the very first time during the performance, often without immediately noticing the physiological changes happening in their own bodies.
Motivations & Questions
The artist traces the project's origin to a pervasive sense of loss and ruin that he frequently observed in everyday conversations across the city:
The performance sought to recreate the familiar, comfortable settings where these conversations naturally happen — like parties or casual hangouts among friends — but framed them to push visitors to genuinely confront their own aspirations. Interestingly, the artist notes that much of what was written on the papers did not resemble traditional wishes at all; a surprising number of people realized they had no clear idea what their personal dreams even were. A second focus was exploring how a basic piece of paper changes status once it is written on:
For the artist, Paper was also an intentional step away from his own centrality. His earlier performances had focused heavily on his own body and physical presence; this work tested what happens when that focal point is entirely removed. In a broader sense, choosing a mix of public and domestic spaces over a traditional studio or gallery was an act of recognition rather than opposition. In his view, standard galleries and studios do not always suit the needs of every artistic gesture and can sometimes be the wrong setting for a work. He emphasizes that this is not a hostility toward official institutions, but rather an attentiveness to finding the exact space a specific artistic moment demands.
People were talking about dreams and wishes that seemed unreachable and already lost — a sense that, in this geography, their dreams had gone with the wind.
We know that burning or tearing up an image or a letter from someone we love will do them no harm — and yet sometimes we don't dare draw a single line across it.
Documentation
Collaborators & Support
All production expenses were covered personally by the artist.
Further Resources
Project page on the artist's website.
About the Artist
Mahmoud Maktabi is an artist whose practice, including Paper, frequently shifts the focus of a performance away from his own body and toward the dialogue and situation created between participants. Born in Tehran in 1985, he began exploring environmental art and performance in 2005 alongside his university studies in painting. His recent work centers on food art and research exploring culture, politics, and the environment. His pieces have been featured in more than fifty-five international exhibitions and festivals across countries including the United States, Italy, Germany, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Canada, South Korea, France, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Romania, Hungary, India, and Iran, alongside five solo shows in Iran and South Korea.
His international engagements include the 57th Venice Biennale, the Contact Photography Festival in Canada, the Tirtha performance festival in Sri Lanka, EcoAvantgarde at the Kunsthalle in Hungary, Contemporary Nature in Transylvania, and five editions of the Nomadic Art Project (NaturArte). Since 2018, he has been the founder and director of the Rah and Vayu residencies, and has spent the past decade working as a speaker and curator across various projects.
Website: mahmoudmaktabi.com Instagram: @mahmoudmaktabi
This entry was prepared based on documentation and texts provided by the artist.