Kissing Strangers as Art Edit
Iranian Ashkan Sahihi Explores Sexuality with Photography

Iranian photographer Ashkan Sahihi is well known for his unorthodox and pretty controversial photography projects. For example, his Drug Series captures the facial expressions of clean and sober people trying various drugs.

One collection that grabbed my attention is his Kiss Series in which he photographed himself kissing strangers.

The series shows Sahihi french kissing different men and women with open mouth. Besides gender, the kissing partners span different ethnic backgrounds. The result is an obvious social commentary on sexuality and race.

Differences in gender, sexuality, race, religion, background, it all does not matter. We are all human and we should love one another. And kiss each other as well. Let me get some mints…

Sahihi was born in Tehran, Iran, in 1963 and moved to New York in 1987.