You are cordially invited to get titillated by Soft Souls.

The latest series by the Iranian-Canadian artist Hoda Zarbaf, Soft Souls, is scheduled to be unveiled on Wednesday April 1, 2015 at Walnut Contemporary in Toronto. Co-curated by Raquel Vilhena and Sanam Samanian, the show renders the intimateand often unspokenfeminal realities. The pieces each reveal a secretive yet tangible moment in solitude, together narrating an allegory of womanly existence.

Imaginative and carefully hand-stitched, the sculptures are made up of recycled textiles, pre-owned clothing, abandoned furniture and orphan dolls. These used materials are not only representative of past experiences, but also reminiscent of lost innocence. Stitches that are both controlled and disorderly unify the soft materials to solid furnishings, creating large figurative sculptures that evoke feminine tropes and bodily dysfunctions. They are women captured in the midst of existence: soft, true, and raw.

Much like the nature of their creator, contradictory concepts are running threads that bind the pieces: permanence and fragility; pain and pleasure; old and new; innocence and vice all sit together in a theatrical, animated presence. The curation of Soft Souls emphasizes universal commonalities. It presents these figures as unfiltered and erotic storytellers on a stage, each whispering about a stagnant experience.

Using sexuality and humor, Zarbaf interrogates representations of womanhood through abstract forms...[her] work delves into womens intimate moments and emerges with a three-dimensional portrayal of varied experiences. - Nastia Voynovskaya, Hi-Fructose Magazine.

Born in Tehran amid early years of the revolution and war, Zarbafs imagination has been influenced by the age-old folktales of her childhood. These stories, in conjunction with her layered and one-off experiences, have formed a whimsical visual language that streams in her work. She received her BFA and MA in Animation from the University of Tehran. In 2008 she relocated to Canada to obtain an MFA from the University of Windsor. Over the years, her work has reflected the complexities of social, emotional, and gender identities. Zarbafs sculptural pieces are made intimately and meticulously in her Annex studio in Toronto.

Walnut Contemporary presents the entire collection on the evening of Wednesday April 1, 2015. For additional information please visit Walnut Contemporary and connect with the Director Ibrina Raquel Vilhena.