Iranian cultural figures protest hijab

Despite the violent government crackdown on the Woman, Life, Freedom protests in 2023, Iranian women persist in defiance through unveiling, singing, and dancing in public, showing the movement's resilience.

In the past three weeks, at least three well-known female artists have made headlines by unveiling in public as an act of civil disobedience.

On December 30, renowned 62-year-old visual artist Bita Fayazi gained widespread attention on social media when she cut the ribbon to inaugurate a government-sponsored art exhibition with her scarf tied around her neck instead of covering her curly gray hair. Some other female participants at the ceremony, mostly young women, also did not cover their hair.

Such defiance of the compulsory hijab was unimaginable before the death of Mahsa Amini in the custody of Iran's morality police in September 2022.

Amini’s death sparked several months of nationwide protests. The 22-year-old Amini was arrested on the street by morality patrols, not for defiance of hijab, but because some of her hair was showing from under her headscarf.

Since then, the number of women who refuse to wear the compulsory hijab in public has grown significantly. Social media reports indicate that seeing unveiled women, even in very conservative religious cities such as Qom and Mashhad, no longer surprises anyone.

Female actresses have been spearheading the anti-compulsory hijab movement since the Woman, Life, Freedom protests at the cost of imprisonment, being banned from working and losing their passports