Daisy-May Hudson outside her family’s temporary accommodation. Photograph: Nick Pomeroy
Daisy-May Hudson and her family became homeless on 12 July 2013. When their landlord, a multinational supermarket, sold off their house, they were forced to pack up their belongings and vacate their home in Essex where they had lived for 13 years.
Unable to afford soaring rents on a single parent income, the family had no choice but to declare themselves homeless. They were moved into a homeless hostel, a large institutional building, for one month. Then they were moved into a second half-way home, where they stayed for just under a year.
Here, the low ceilings and pebble-dash walls were far from homely. Not only were they forced to share the microscopic bathroom and kitchen with another family, but they were prohibited from decorating or having visitors. “But who’d want to come?” says Daisy-May. “My sister’s school friends don’t even know she’s here.”
Daisy-May, who now lives in Dalston with friends, decided to record the entire experience of displacement on film. Since then, she has turned 250 hours of fervent footage into a feature-length documentary called Half Way. She says that by documenting the emotional turmoil of living between homes “the film was able to serve as a coping mechanism for the family – a positive force in a time that was otherwise painfully stagnant”. What’s more, in breaking down the distinction between subject and director, this firsthand account offers a uniquely intimate insight into the trauma of homelessness.
In the past few months, the family has been rehoused. Filming has finished and last month Daisy-May and a group of filmmakers managed to raise the £10,000 needed for post-production work.
Daisy-May says that Half Way is an attempt to put a “human face” to the statistics behind the UK’s housing crisis and in so doing spark social change. The statistics she cites make grim reading. According to Shelter there are more than 1.8 million people on the waiting list for social housing.
Families are the worst off, with over 70 per cent of rent or mortgage payers with children struggling or falling behind with payments as of January 2014. In Hackney, Shelter has found that the average annual salary would have to increase by more than £100,000 to keep up with house prices.
In offering an honest and intimate depiction of one family’s tale of displacement, Half Way captures the desperate experience of homelessness from a family who endured and overcame it. In doing so, the documentary overturns callous misconceptions and stereotypes of homelessness.
Embroiled in a life of petty crime on the streets of the East End during the 80s, screenwriter Martin Askew watched the lives of many close friends and associates fall apart around him. On the same path to destruction, the young Cockney found his way out through a combination of the arts and Islam, and he’s put both into his most recent work.
Snow in Paradise follows the exploits of an ambitious young criminal, Dave (Frederick Schmidt), as he seeks to impress his hoodlum uncle, played by Askew himself. When Dave’s actions lead to the devastating death of his best mate, Tariq (Aymen Hamdouchi), he finds care and support amongst the Muslim community at his local mosque, but not before a rough internal struggle takes him right down to rock bottom.
“It’s obviously a very redemptive-type story of someone who’s been brought up in the East End in a very dysfunctional and quite violent environment, and he manages to pull away from that lifestyle and surrender himself to peace,” Askew explains over the phone, in a slow East End drawl.
“I wanted to be involved in something that can turn people away from violence and that sort of life.”
The film’s fiery script was co-written and brought to life by debutant director Andrew Hulme, who’s known for his sharp editing work on Control, Red Riding 1974 and The Imposter. In no danger of glamourising the darker side of East London, it’s an in-your-face anti-gangster flick delivered with real artsy flair.
“I wanted to make a film that was both a thriller and a character piece,” Hulme says, “something that rode the line between commercial and art-house. One of the things that interested me about it was the fact that it is quite political – here is a guy who embraces a castigated religion.”
Part fictional, part autobiographical, part steeped in history and extremely current, there’s a good bit to chew on. Excluded from the rapidly changing – gentrifying – landscape in which he lives, Dave’s choice is to struggle and suffer, skint and crime-free, or to struggle and suffer as a criminal with enough cash in his pocket to take the edge off things. On top of all this, his part-time girlfriend’s a sex worker and he’s got a serious drug habit.
Dave (Frederick Schmidt) and Amjad (Ashley Chin) wash their hands in a mosque
When, in desperate search of the missing Tariq, he stumbles into a mosque, something clicks and things gradually become a little less complicated – he falls into a kind of spiritual therapy.
“I certainly feel that Islam is a religion that is mis-portrayed by the media – that is misunderstood by the public because of that,” Hulme says. “Contrary to what we are told, the vast majority of Muslims are actually peace-loving. Like one of our characters says in the film, Islam means peace. It literally does. That’s not to deny that aspects of it are twisted to suit other people’s ends. But we know that story, that’s what we’re told all the time.”
Snow in Paradise successfully presents a new narrative. Steering the London gangster genre down an unfamiliar and refreshing road, the conversion storyline came directly from Askew’s own life.
“It’s just brushstrokes really of my experiences,” Askew says. “When I was growing up in the 70s and the 80s in East London, it was quite a criminal culture. And when you’re born into that sort of culture you just think it’s normal, and growing up I just thought this is how everyone lives.
“As I got older, when a friend of mine died and then I lost another four of my friends in a horrific car crash on the way to a friend’s funeral – who got murdered – I started questioning and I started searching for stuff in religions.”
He explains that despite exploring a wide range of religions and philosophies, he struggled to distance himself from his wayward lifestyle and continued to slip back into old habits. But when he was almost killed in a serious attack outside a nightclub, someone suggested that he read the Quran.
“It was just pragmatic and it helped me open up my eyes to another world I’d not experienced growing up in my community. My role models were all very colourful people, but the hard-living lifestyle was almost monolithic. My people were very socially oppressed to some extent and it’s a big mountain to climb for change,” he says.
Dave (Frederick Schmidt)
“I was fortunate to have some sort of epiphany after about six months of clean time and it helped me in my art, it helped in my writing, it gave me structure.”
As well as its progressively original storyline, the piece is driven by a searing lead performance from Frederick Schmidt, a previously unknown actor who was discovered puffing a cigarette on a Hoxton street corner by a casting scout.
“He didn’t believe we were real,” says Hulme. “But he came in anyway and before he knew it we were offering him another audition. We put him through a few more tests, different auditions, different scenes. He was very raw and had never acted before, but we all saw the potential in him. So we decided to push on.”
It was a good decision. There are traces in Schmidt’s performance of the intensity of a young Tom Hardy. He has the capacity to carry a scene on his broad shoulders in much the same vein as Jack O’Connell in David Mackenzie’s ferocious prison drama Starred Up. Expect to see plenty more of him.
Also surprising is Askew’s excellent turn as the ruthless Uncle Jimmy. Dark, brooding and unsettlingly composed, he makes for a convincing villain. His, too, was an unexpected appointment.
“Because I’d acted before, Frederick and I were actually rehearsing intensely together – doing boxing training and acting training. And after weeks of this, I think they started to realise that they had someone who had potential,” he explains.
“I had to read for it and then I got recalled, and then again, and eventually I got the role, which was a bit of a shock because I really didn’t expect to be acting in this film. Because of where I grew up, I had a lot of backstory to draw on, you know. I tried not to play him like a screen gangster but more in the vein of a real gangster.”
Dave (Frederick Schmidt) facing a difficult decision
With the film complete and set for release this month, Askew looks back on it as a cathartic experience. For a long time he’s been directly involved with the gangster genre, telling bits and pieces of his own story – he worked as associate producer on Guy Ritchie’s RocknRolla – and now he’s ready to move on to fresh challenges.
As well as continuing his already established writing career, he’s turning his attention to charitable work, with plans to encourage troubled youngsters to get interested in the creative industries and to tell their own stories.
“Hopefully this film can help me do stuff with young guys who are involved in gangs or maybe living in a very macho world where being involved in the arts is something that’s contrary to their codes. I feel I’ve been there and I’ve seen it and I’ve got the battle scars and the trauma.
“I know how it can only take one push to help you go down another road, and that road could open doors to a very nice life.”
Island mentalities: Dead Air. Image courtesy of Robert Bradbrook
Stoke Newington-based animator Robert Bradbrook has been busy of late. As well as balancing a job at the National Film School, teaching at Middlesex University and a role working on the film Tony Benn: Will and Testament, he last October saw his most recent short premiere at the London Film Festival.
Dead Air is a fable for modern Britain. A quiet island community, untouched and content in its isolation, is thrown into a state of quiet paranoia when a bridge built to the mainland brings with it the threat of an unknowable future. New arrival DJ Pete (Jonah Russell), with his irreverent radio show, is enough to tip the priggish locals towards hysteria.
But, as Bradbrook makes clear, change is constant and those who try to resist it need only stop for a moment and take a look around.
“It’s just the idea of a community that thinks it’s been the same all the time, but in fact it’s always been evolving,” he explains enthusiastically, taking a breather from a work Christmas party to chat over the phone. “The idea came from when the Channel Tunnel arrived and there were all these fears about what it might bring.”
Rocky start
Change and landscape are integral to Bradbrook’s vision. Having studied geology as an undergraduate, before turning his attention to cartography and then film, he was keen to integrate his early studies into his work.
As such, he’s created a world in which the coastal features – the cliffs, hills and beaches – shift and reshape in an exaggerated way, mirroring the society that we, and his characters, live in.
“I’ve always had this background of rocks and the landscape and things like that, so there was a kind of joy in bringing that original degree back into the game,” he says. “It’s like I’ve built this world in animation and now I can do whatever I like with it – I can move through time.
“Often we’ll look at something and it looks a bit still, and then we’ll change the time rate, speed it up and we can actually see that it’s moving, so things that look really static are in fact forever changing.”
While the topography tells its own story, a more conventional narrative unfolds on air during DJ Pete’s live phone-ins. In contrast to the fluster of calls from concerned locals, Laura (Victoria Bewick), who works at a mushroom factory, welcomes the newcomer – and the future – with open arms and an optimistic outlook.
Hers is a view that Bradbrook shares: “The underlying message of the film is a hopeful one. Communities have been developing and people have been arriving from faraway places since the year dot. In essence, it’s not something to worry about.”
It seems that living in Hackney has played a part in shaping the ideas behind the film, I suggest. He whole-heartedly agrees.
“Hackney is a community that is just completely mixed, everyone is from various places around the world and clearly it’s my view that that’s a good thing, it’s worth celebrating.
“The hero of the film is this girl. Whilst everyone’s moaning and worrying about change, she’s like ‘no, it’s brilliant, it’s fantastic – we’re going to get lots of different things coming here.’ And so it’s almost a celebration of what Hackney is, in a funny sort of way.”
With all the hard work on Dead Air complete, and no little praise coming from those who have already seen it, Bradbrook is content to watch it do the rounds on the festival circuit. “It’s the nice bit,” he says.
Currency of favours
Having finished the project with considerable help from friends, he’s now busy returning the goodwill. In what’s a difficult period financially for filmmaking, he’s pleased to be part of a community of artists who operate on a currency of favours.
“In this day and age it costs so much money to make these films,” he explains. “I was lucky to get small bits of funding from here and there, but you can’t make a film on that funding, so you have to find another way. One of the ways is that you work on someone else’s film for nothing and then
they return the favour and it carries
on like that.
“It’s exciting because it means that all we want to do is make films and be involved in films and it allows you to do that.”
Rich Mix is facing an uncertain future should it be forced to repay £850,000 to Tower Hamlets Council in one lump sum. The Shoreditch arts centre has decided to go public with the details of a legal dispute with the council dating back to 2011.
The council is demanding repayment of £850,000 given to the arts organisation in 2002 to enable the organisation to complete the refurbishment of its premises at 35-47 Bethnal Green Road.
Rich Mix claims it was never settled whether this money was a one-off grant or a loan that would have to be paid back. But in 2011, the council served legal papers demanding immediate repayment of the entire sum.
It is not clear why the council has demanded all the money at once, but Rich Mix says it does not have sufficient financial reserves to pay the money and that the centre would find it difficult to continue to operate if it did.
Rich Mix CEO, Jane Earl said that the arts centre disputes that the money needs to be paid back, though has offered to do so in instalments, adding: “What we mustn’t do is pay it in a way that will make us go bust.”
She also claims that the council is withholding £1.6 million owed to Rich Mix as part of the planning agreement for a nearby development. Under this agreement, the developer, Telford Homes, paid over £2 million towards cultural development in the immediate area. The council’s Strategic Development Committee decided in 2010 that this money would go to Rich Mix.
A formal contract was drawn up for the money to be transferred but contained no specific targets that Rich Mix would need to meet in order for the funds to be handed over. The contract was recently judged “unenforceable” by a court because of the lack of firm targets.
Earl blames the contract’s poor drafting on the council, who rejected the idea of targets. She said: “In 2011 the council said it would be premature for us to set targets when we didn’t know what our level of Arts Council support would be.”
Following the court judgement, Rich Mix has proposed a deal whereby the council would hand over the £1.6 million of development money and in return Rich Mix would pay the council the outstanding £850,000.
Asked whether the council is using its power over funding to shut down Rich Mix, Earl declined to comment. She is, however, concerned that some councillors hold a negative view of its activities, including the “idea that it’s some kind of licentious drinking den”.
A spokesperson for Tower Hamlets Council said: “The council considers that it would be inappropriate to comment on either ongoing litigation or associated settlement discussions. Irrespective of the litigation between the parties the council remains open to constructive discussions with Rich Mix over possible partnership funding.
“During these difficult times for local government funding and taking into account the council’s statutory obligations, the council must ensure that any further funding is appropriate, affordable and delivers value for the borough.”
Stick ’em up! Eve Hedderick-Turner, Matilda Sturridge and Bonnie Wright star in How (Not) to Rob a Train playing at Hackney Picturehouse on 13 January as part of the London Short Film Festival. Photograph: Claire Pepper
Short films will be in plentiful supply this month with the return of the London Short Film Festival to cinemas in East London.
Hackney Picturehouse and Oval Space are two of the host venues for the 12th edition of the festival, taking place from 9–18 January.
This year’s programme is billed as a snapshot of 21st Century Britain, complete with love stories, horror stories, comedy, documentary, music and low budget gems.
An eclectic itinerary includes themed programmes such as Surreal World and Night of the Living Docs, as well as special screenings and events.
Iain Sinclair and Andrew Kötting will be discussing their new project By Our Selves, a film that traces the journey of Romantic poet John Clare from Epping Forest to Northamptonshire accompanied by a straw bear.
Other highlights include a fashion film programme, a night of queer short film and music, and Fourwalls, a selection of films about housing made by Londoners.
Favouring original voices over mainstream filmmakers, the LSFF has become the most comprehensive showcase of short film in the UK.
Festival director Philip Ilson has spelt out the festival’s mission, saying: “We want to be challenging and questioning; looking behind the curtain to seek out what’s hidden, and expose it to the world.
“It’s an amazing feeling to get wowed by the ground breaking creative work coming through year after year and get that out in front of excited audiences.”
Last summer’s secret screening: Back to the Future. Photograph: Al Overdrive
Secret Cinema is to make a shock comeback this weekend with a one-off charity screening in East London, San Francisco and Rome as a protest against “the attack on freedom of expression” represented by threats against screening political comedy The Interview.
The simultaneous screenings will take place at 6.30pm GMT on Sunday 21 December, with tickets priced £25 and all proceeds going to free speech charity Article 19.
The film and East London location are for now under wraps, though organisers have asked filmgoers to wear dark suits and bring a small gift for a stranger.
With three screenings already confirmed, Secret Cinema is looking for more global partners to join in with the simultaneous screenings. This, they hope, will strengthen the resolve of filmmakers and artists against the threat of censorship, and show solidarity with artists whose freedom of expression is routinely curtailed.
Secret Cinema’s previous charity screening of Dead Poet’s Society in August 2014 raised over £24,000 for mental health charity Mind.
Iain Sinclair at the launch of 70×70. Photograph: Laura Bradley
Something about Iain Sinclair’s latest book screams of a serious author having some serious fun. 70×70 – Unlicensed Preaching: A Life Unpacked In 70 Films is a deliciously poetic documentation of a sprawling curation project that does exactly what it says on the tin, and then some.
In celebration of his 70th birthday – and in response to a suggestion made by King Mob’s Paul Smith – the Hackney wordsmith rummaged through his own back catalogue in search of traces of works he’s hunted, happened upon, made and admired. From it, he pulled a film for every year to date, weaving together a rich sort of cultural autobiography.
Over the next 12 months, Sinclair screened all 70 films in a series of special events across the city, trekking out to obscure parts of town to talk about everything from Douglas Sirk’s wonderful Tarnished Angels to Patricio Guzmán’s jaw-dropping Nostalgia for the Light.
With the mammoth undertaking done and dusted, Unlicensed Preaching represents something of a project journal.
The book is split into two main parts: the first a collection of short passages offering nutritious insight into each of the films concerned, and the second a record of the events held, comprising Sinclair’s intros, transcripts of conversations, and contributions from friends and collaborators, such as Alan Moore, Chris Petit and Andrew Kötting.
The essays in the first section are sure to delight anyone with a modicum of interest in film. Whether or not you’ve seen the material is of minor significance. Reading about Kiefer Sutherland making “a pass at that cryogenic Burroughs voice of world-weary cynicism” opposite Courtney Love’s “emboldened” Joan Vollmer in Beat – and what it is about this bizarre feature that works – is fascinating, regardless of prior knowledge.
Reading about directors you are more likely to have preconceptions of – like Godard, Sirk, Welles and Hitchcock – is an education, but perhaps most interesting are the commentaries on Sinclair’s own work and that of his friends. An extended piece on his collaboration with Petit and Susan Stenger on Marine Court Rendezvous – “where the silenced dead catch up with their fugitive souls” – is simply marvellous. And the same goes for his thoughts on Kötting’s stunning This Our Still Life.
The second section expands on the reasoning behind his choices and furthers the intrigue. We learn about things like the “collaging and bricolage of sounds”, the spillage as “projects leak into each other”, and much more. He loosely situates each film within both a personal and wider cultural landscape, with key figures and ideas popping up over and again.
This unclassifiable book knits a complex tapestry of history, memory, documentary and fiction in a way that those familiar with Sinclair’s writing will surely recognise. His sentences are often dense and always thrilling to roll your tongue around. But his ideas on the past, present and future of cinema are what remain, steadfast and long after reading.
70×70: Unlicensed Preaching: A Life Unpacked in 70 Films is published by Volcano Publishing. ISBN: 9780992643454. RRP: £25
Having notched up some serious critical acclaim with his first venture, The Phone Call, local screenwriter James Lucas has turned to the streets of Hackney for his latest work in progress. Thus far, the script for the intriguingly titled Bohemian Motorcycle Club is just about finished and makes for a riveting read.
“Its about a disillusioned young advertising exec called Ed,” explains Lucas. “He gets drawn into an exciting world of choppers, liquor and women via a fledgling motorcycle club, The Bohemians. He sees an opportunity, applies some of his skillset to the club and helps them to make money.
“Unfortunately, hard partying, a forbidden love affair and the entrance of an outlaw biker gang precipitate a descent into criminality and violence.”
A passionate motorcycle enthusiast himself, Lucas took inspiration from two of his friends who founded the refreshingly inclusive East London-based biker brand Black Skulls.
“I love motorbikes so I was immediately drawn in by the rumble of engines and the line up of bikes outside their garage. My imagination began racing and I thought a biker gang based in Hackney was a very original basis for a film.”
The script suggests something of a Spaghetti Western set in amongst the trendy, creative terrain of the modern-day East End – still rough and endearingly ragged round the edges. It presents a clutch of brand new Hackney characters that haven’t previously seen the light of day on screen, and is laced with local insight and profound authenticity.
Perhaps also demonstrating a sense of tiredness with the tedium of the day-to-day corporate world, it seems in part to be about taking a risk, branching out and trying something brave and a little bit wild.
“I look at the burgeoning custom bike scene here in Hackney and across the globe and I see it as an interesting way to view London – almost like looking at it through an oil-smudged pair of eyes. It’s this fresh approach I’m excited about and I’d like to produce a film that’s all at once stylish, unflinching, slightly feral and entertaining.”
On first impressions, it would appear to mark quite a departure from the stark and glorious simplicity of The Phone Call – an engrossing short that focuses entirely on a single phone conversation between Sally Hawkins and a troubled Jim Broadbent. But for Lucas there are definite similarities.
“The Phone Call is a very soulful tale and if you peel back the Screaming Eagle mufflers and tattoos in Bohemian Motorcycle Club, underneath you’ll find it’s similarly a story about human connection and drama. Empathy seems to be a common thread in my writing.”
With his first short standing a good chance of an Oscar nomination early next year and plans to start making Bohemian Motorcycle Club in 2015, it’s an exciting time for this talented Hackney writer. He’s also working on a psychosexual thriller TV series, The Chameleon, and he’s some way into a Paul Gascoigne biopic that’s now in official development. With his plate stacked high and heavy, how’s he coping with the pressure?
“I think the success of The Phone Call has galvanised me to continue writing and producing compelling film. In terms of pressure, come back to me when Bohemian Motorcycle Club goes into pre-production. I’ll probably be on serious meds by then.”
Two to tango: Real people were filmed dancing in Mariano Cohn and Gaston Duprat’s documentary Living Stars
Winter is finally sinking its fangs in, but citizens come warm yourselves in some Argentine sunshine this week as Hackney plays host to some of South America’s hottest cinema.
The Argentine Film Festival, now in its third year, returns to London from 27–30 November, with screenings at Hackney Picturehouse and at Brixton Ritzy, kicking off with black comedy Relatos Salvajes (Wild Tales) this Thursday.
A hit at Cannes a couple of months ago, the film is produced by the Almodóvar brothers and directed by Damian Szifron, already selling two million tickets back in Argentina and sure to get the festival off with a bang.
Movies & Malbec
Meanwhile, for those of you familiar with some the country’s more widely-known exports such as Malbec and Tango (or anyone that needs an extra incentive for watching sub-titles), this year will see a dedicated wine hub set up shop at the Gallery Bar in the Hackney Picturehouse.
It sounds like Punto Argento will be the perfect place to rendezvous to talk about the films, with the Tango Light troupe performing between screenings for a real taste of Argentine culture. “We’re delighted to be back for our third edition with a knock-out programme that includes three of Argentina’s highest-grossing films from the last 18 months, as well as some amazing gems from the international festival circuit and some unique documentaries,” says the festival’s director, Sofia Serbin de Skalon.
El Cine Argentino
The fact that we can now go to a festival of Argentine films at all is of course, in itself, notable. Forty years ago the country’s movie industry was still muzzled by a paranoid military junta, which chased some of the most promising filmmakers of a generation underground or into exile.
When democracy returned to the country in the 1980s films like La historia oficial, which deals with the horrors of the regime, received critical acclaim, but like many foreign-language films at the time did not gain mainstream traction outside of Latin America. However, there’s no doubt films from this region are beginning to resonate with international audiences, with high-profile movies such a Walter Salles’ Motorcycle Diaries (2004) and Fernando Meirelles’ City of God (2002) helping pave the way for Spanish language movies in non-Spanish speaking countries.
The Oscar win for El secreto de sus ojos (The Secret in their Eyes) in 2010, however, can be seen as a significant inflection point for Argentine cinema, with Hollywood shining a spotlight on the country’s rich film heritage. It was by no means the country’s first big prize, but its surprise box office success did much to win over new audiences.
What’s On
Over the weekend you’ll have the chance to see 10 contemporary films from and about Argentina. As ever, there’s a rich sweep of styles and genres, from Death In Buenos Aires about a detective solving a 1980s high society homicide in the country’s shaky first steps of democracy to Cerro Torre, which explores the ethics of mountaineering and the ascent of Patagonia’s most-dangerous mountain.
Also not to be missed is the Nuevos Talentos section, where you can watch seven short films from some of the country’s most-promising young directors. This is well worth checking out for a flavour of the sharpest talent in Argentina right now, with films exploring everything from Argentina becoming a safe haven for Nazis after WWII to beauty queens.
Argentine Film Festival is at Hackney Picturehouse and Brixton Ritzy from 27–30 November.
TV activist: Maryam Violet. Photograph: Ryan Hubbs
When the Iranian Green Movement broke out in June 2009, Maryam Violet watched from a computer screen as a reported three million reformers marched against former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Having arrived in the UK in January 2009, Violet was about to start a PhD in astrophysics, but the protests changed all that. Her entire life became devoted to “sitting at a computer, watching the news and searching for videos and seeing how people in Tehran’s prisons were getting abruptly raped and tortured”.
Violet soon realised that as an Iranian woman she couldn’t afford to have her head in the stars and follow her dream of working for Nasa.
Instead, Violet became production manager of Zanan TV, an Iranian feminist and activist TV channel that has production offices in Hackney. It was set up in 2011 by Violet’s mother, Mahboubeh Abbasgholizadeh, who runs the main office in New York.
Abbasgholizadeh is a high profile, prominent Iranian feminist and activist who fled Iran after she was imprisoned three times.
Although inspired by her mother, Violet insists on keeping her own identity. She says that until June 2009 “I wasn’t destined to become an active feminist… I came to London with just one suitcase; I was planning to go back. My valuables and all my memories, everything was left in Iran.”
But Violet has never returned to Iran. She misses friends, family and sometimes even the smell of pollution in Tehran, but her activism is stronger than ever. As a feminist she aims through Zanan TV “to fight against discrimination, obtain equal rights in the constitution, see less abuse in daily lives and fight for more freedom” for women in Iran who she says are viewed as “second-class citizens”.
Violet considers the 2013 elections of President Rouhani as a political act designed to improve Iran’s international footing.
“He made some international political gestures, like when he released Nasrin Sotoudeh, a feminist human rights lawyer, but his domestic reforms didn’t evolve,” she insists.
Last month Iran executed Reyhaneh Jabbari, a woman accused of murdering an intelligence service officer who she said had tried to sexually abuse her. Violet describes it as “the execution of all of us”.
“I don’t know if she killed him or not, but what I don’t understand is how as human beings we can decide to end the lives of others with our own hands.”
According to the UN, more than 250 people were executed in Iran in 2013.
However, Violet remains optimistic about the future of the country and was moved by the international campaign urging for Jabbari to be spared the death sentence.
For now, though, Violet’s dreams lie within the field of journalism. Her ambition is to become the next Oriana Fallaci, the Italian feminist journalist notorious in Iran for ripping off the chador while interviewing Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979.