Nasrin Tabatabai and Babak Afrassiabi's 'Seep' at MACBA explores Iranian modernity through archival juxtaposition

Nasrin Tabatabai and Babak Afrassiabi's exhibition 'Seep' at Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) interrogates Iranian modernity by juxtaposing two archives. One archive involves British Petroleum's promotional film halted before Iran's 1951 oil nationalization, while the other concerns the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art's collection of Western art, acquired in the mid-1970s for £2.5 billion and stored since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The artists, based in Tehran and known for the publication Pages, present two videos: a road movie tracing oil seeps and a poetic reflection on the 'unfilmable' nature of such quests. Curator Soledad Gutiérrez frames the show within MACBA's thematic rehang emphasizing art-as-archive, though the work's journalistic claims are tempered by its avoidance of radical stances, given Iran's intolerance of critique. The installation includes an incomplete list of Tehran's hidden Western artworks and a model of the museum, with the collection having been partially shown in 1999 and viewable by appointment. A reviewer notes the natural phenomenon of oil seepage, contrasting expectations of environmental critique, and observes that the sequestration of blue-chip masters may benefit younger Iranian artists by freeing exhibition space. The aesthetic beauty of oil seeps is highlighted, yet the show hesitates to engage fully with visuality, mirroring Iran's censorship of Western art. 'Seep' will travel to London's Chisenhale Gallery in spring.