The Virtual Shepherd: Love and Screen Addiction at the End of the World.
Posted
by C3W Admin on
November 12 2025
In October 2025, we inaugurated a photographic exhibition and short ethnographic documentary currently being displayed in
Exeter.
It’s titled: The Virtual Shepherd: Love and Screen Addiction at the End of the World.
It is a photographic and video exploration of Ali, a young shepherd in Iran’s remote 70 Peaks Valley. In the 2010s, he managed a Telegram chat with over 5,000 members, sustaining a vibrant online life he called majāzi — “the virtual.” The exhibition invites viewers to reflect on the surreal intersection of rural life and digital connectivity, where the smartphone becomes a site of desire, longing, and endless scrolling. Even as platforms change, the experience of being online remains strikingly familiar.
For those interested, please get in touch with me so I can send you the passcode.
I am hoping to screen it around in the UK and Europe and I’d appreciate if you could let me know in case there are opportunities, I may not be aware of.
With best wishes,
Maziyar
Professor Maziyar Ghiabi (DPhil, MPhil Oxon)
Associate Professor of Social Sciences and Medical Humanities
Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences
Director of Impact at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies (IAIS)
Director of the Centre for Persian and Iranian Studies
University of Exeter
