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Do clothes make the woman? An Iranian artist's search for identity

The works of Mona Hakimi-Schueler, an Iranian artist based in Berlin, depicts Iranian women not as victims but strong individuals whether in a hijab, summer dress or armor.
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"Which of these faces is the real me as an Iranian woman?"

That is the question the Berlin-based artist Mona Hakimi-Schueler posed more than a decade ago with a series of self-portraits depicting her in 20 different outfits ranging from a sundress to a chador. The paintings were inspired by debates in Germany over whether female teachers should be allowed to wear headscarves in classrooms.

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