About

Hossein Tavazoni-Zadeh is a performance maker, educator, and PhD candidate at the University of Groningen. Working at the intersection of academia and the arts, his research and artistic practice bring together Cultural Memory Studies, film, and performance to explore images of the past, the memory of place, and notions of archive, remembering/forgetting, and heritage. 

His portfolio includes award-winning stage productions, site-based projects, and online performances. Notably, he received three consecutive honors in the experimental theatre section of the International Fadjr Theatre Festival: Best Play for The Butterfly (2017) and Aras (2019), and Best Performance for Narges (2018). In addition to directing and artistic research, he has taught and led workshops at institutions and theatre schools in Iran, the Netherlands, and France, and has collaborated as a writer, dramaturge, and stage designer on various theatre and film productions.

Inspired by his series of site-based performances in Tehran during the 2010s, Hossein’s doctoral research investigates how media and fiction shape the memory of—and invest emotions in—the built environment, with a particular focus on domestic and everyday spaces. He holds a Master’s degree in Film Studies from Sooreh University in Iran, where his thesis explored how Iranian site-based theatre draws on filmic language to shape the experience of architectural space.