Ali Banisadr with David Anfam New Social Environment #42

Painter Ali Banisadr (Instagram: @simorgh3) joins art historian and Rail Editor-at-Large David Anfam (Instagram: @davidanfam) for a discussion on Banisadr’s multi-layered process, the psychedelic and emotional immediacy of Renaissance painting, and literary influence in the New Social Environment #42. ⁠In response to the imminent crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Brooklyn Rail shifted our operations online. These New Social Environments provide a place to have vibrant conversations in a time of great physical distancing. ⁠

Banisadr cut his teeth in San Francisco's Mission School before moving to New York, and is a devoted student of art history, evident in his 2018 interview with the Rail, “Looking at Titian, Goya, Manet, and Picasso... you could activate the sentiment in each of their works, be it love, the destruction of war, or jealousy, etc., … and see the similar relationship to contemporary life..It still speaks to our time. Likewise, something made today evokes something ancient.”