Welcome Into a space where film, improvisation, and poetry meet
Shaghayegh Yassemi
My name is Shaghayegh (شقایق), which means “poppy” in Persian. I feel deeply connected to my name, as poppies are fiercely red, wild, and free.
I love being one of them.
I am a multi-disciplinary researcher, filmmaker, and educator. Over the past few years, my artistic and academic journey has taken me through theatre, film, poetry, and critical studies in improvisation. Each field has deepened my understanding of art as an active, participatory force in everyday life. I am a PhD candidate in Critical Studies in Improvisation, with an MFA in film production from Concordia University, and an MA in theatre from Soore University of Tehran. My films have been showcased at international film festivals and academic events, including Fotogenia (Mexico), the Second Poetic Cinema Festival (Argentina), Hillside (Canada), TaPRA (England), and the New York Arthouse Film Festival.
Ongoing
A Travel Checklist (2025) – Short Film, Performance
A Travel Checklist is a short film, currently in its final stage of postproduction. It drifts through the final hours of a young woman leaving her hometown. In a creative collage of documented improvisational performances and illustrated explorations, the city murmurs in fragments—poems, visions, fleeting acts—blurring the lines between memory and moment. The quiet rush of transition brings questions to the surface, lingering like an unfinished verse.
Through layers of fragments, the film engages the audience in a collaborative experience, rather than presenting a solid story to be watched.
Creation Roles:
Poeticized and Directed by: Shaghayegh Yassemi
Performers: Shaghayegh Yassemi, Maedeh Jalai, Emad Emami
Illustrator: Sara Ayman Ragab — Illustration Consultant: Yasaman Pourmokhtar
Duet of The Improvising streets (2023)
Duet of the Improvising Streets (2023) is a walking performance and a short film; performed and recorded between September 2021 and October 2022 in Toronto and Tehran. During seven performances, I delivered parcels/letters containing hand-printed verses of some poems, and a prepaid envelope, along Yonge Street (Toronto) and Valiasr Street (Tehran). People were asked to contribute to the project by sending their responses to the project via the prepaid envelopes if they would like. The performances were recorded with a GoPro worn by me, the performer. I edited the recorded footage which were about 70 hours long and made a 15-minutes filmic poetry.
In the Duet of the Improvising Streets, two exceptionally long north-south streets, extending for 18 kilometers within the borders of the cities, take central roles. Both streets are of historical importance and are sources of remarkable cultural diversity. The two streets, separated by 10000 kilometers, meet through the film fragments and are in poetic dialogue with each other. Walking down extended streetscapes is a metaphor for the process of ambient engagement in diverse communities.
Duet of the Improvising Streets has been selected for 12 international film festivals, including Fotogenia in Mexico and the Second Poetic Cinema Festival in Argentina. It was a finalist at the So Limitless and Free International Film Festival in Canada, and at the Toronto International Nollywood Film Festival, where it was a finalist in three categories: Best Student Film, Best Female Filmmaker, and Best Poetry Film. It was also selected as a semi-finalist at the New York Arthouse Film Festival and the Vesuvius International Film Awards in Italy.
The project received a range of responses from both streets, including poems, leaves, drawings, and more. The responses are reminders that reciprocal relations and hospitality are key to how communities self-sustain. The following images showcase four of these responses.
