Deniz is an Iranian-American multidisciplinary artist based in New York. Her works experiment with form and they focus on memory, grief, immigration and the concept of home. Her plays have been performed in several national and international festivals. She has written and directed experimental music-theatre projects that challenge the status quo and current vernacular of the theatre and modern opera scene. Her performances have been praised as “excellent” (The Boston Globe) , “remarkable on every level”(Ewing Reviewing) and “Fascinating” (Broadway World LA). A former resident artist at Center at West Park and a resident playwright at the New Perspectives theatre women’s play lab, she has also designed and directed international shows, video arts and shadow puppetry visuals for companies such as OperFrankfurt, Guerilla Opera, Dinosaur Annex, and Long Beach Opera.Holding an MA in Theatre from City University of New York,she has trained in master classes and workshops with prominent international artists including Peter Brook,Richard Schechner, Paul Zaloom and Gardzienice theatre company of Poland. She is an adjunct lecturer at Hunter college and Queens borough community college of CUNY. Deniz has performed extensively in her hometown Tehran as well as on stages of prominent theatre companies of Boston and New York.

Awarded by UNIMA-USA for “excellence in writing for the art of puppetry” she has been the recipient of NYSCA award for her new project “Husks from Iran”, as well as the NYFA fund for her Oscar-qualified documentary animated web series, “Diasporan”, for which she is the writer, director, animator and singer and explores the daily struggles of immigrants. (www.denizkhateri.com)

This solo, multi-disciplinary performance uses live musical instruments as puppets, along with shadow play and poetry to follow an Iranian immigrant as she grapples with questions around assimilation and whether to keep an unwanted pregnancy.