This series, or shift in her artistic focus, became clear to her when she moved to North Carolina six years ago from Boston, Mass. Leaving behind her closest friends and family, she felt a certain emptiness in not having those close ties.
“Women have something different with other women — something different than the relationships that men have with other men,” she said. “We need feedback or approval or opinions — just something.”
Shirin’s latest work is focused strongly on this idea. Her canvasses are large pieces of wood, and her preferred medium is a mixture of exotic printed paper and paint. Whether or not it was deliberate, the foundation of wood could be construed as the subconscious intention that relationships must be rooted naturally, and those relationships that are nurtured spread roots and grow.
Aesthetically, the color palette stays on the warm side of the spectrum — reds, oranges, yellows — but does tend to dip into the violets and greens.
For the visual structure, Shirin acknowledges one of her favorite artists, Gustav Klimt, as laying the groundwork for her composition of females. Shirin, like Klimt, dresses her subjects in ornate patterns, often surrounding them in golden backgrounds speckled with detail.
Shirin started her quest into the artistic world in the fourth grade when she began working with a private tutor. Her instructors told her parents that she was drawing and illustrating well above her age, and her parents nurtured this gift. By the time she was in the eighth grade she was taking painting classes, studying artists such as Bob Ross on television and laying the groundwork for what would hopefully be her career. Upon graduating high school, Shirin was the president of the Art Honor Society. In 1997, she graduated from the University of Massachusetts with a Bachelor of Fine Arts — a degree that she admits didn’t help her in getting full-time work.