Laleh Motlagh is an Iranian Azerbaijani-American artist whose work explores themes of displacement, cultural memory, and identity. Born in Tabriz, Iran, and later relocating to Chicago, her practice reflects the duality of living between geographies and histories. Her installations frequently incorporate botanical and found materials to examine how personal and collective pasts are preserved, interpreted, and transformed through time and movement.
Motlagh’s work often reimagines Persian cultural artifacts within Western museum settings, revealing the tension between preservation and erasure. Through materials like leaves, textiles, and architectural fragments, she constructs poetic installations that question the boundaries of belonging and the permanence of place.
