Screenshot from the video: “The Third Space: The Affective Atmosphere of Coffeehouses” by Elham Puriya Mehr, 2023.

Coffeehouse culture emerged during the Safavid period in Iran in the 16th century in the city of Isfahan, pioneered significant performative methods of sharing knowledge through storytelling called Naqqāli’ as well as particular coffeehouse painting schools. Coffeehouses were places of community and friendship as well as sites to share knowledge, and ideas, and support each other. They were particularly crucial as affordable, egalitarian places which had the effect of shifting normative class structures. Years later, coffee in England was identified as a ‘sober’ drink, and the coffeehouse culture of Iran and Turkey had been seen by English travelers which encouraged Londoners to create a fantastic form of social space in London. The coffeehouses played a useful role in developing England’s greater political freedom. The polite conversation within these spaces led to the reasoned and sober debate on matters of politics, science, literature, poetry, commerce, and religion, so much so that London coffeehouses became known as ‘penny universities,’ as that was the price of a cup of coffee. While contemporary coffeehouses have forgotten these possibilities, their activities right before what Habermas named the ‘public sphere’ presented a site of challenge to hierarchical and colonial power structures that their 'study' may activate the potentiality of alternatives to failing contemporary institutional structures.

We invite you to join Griffin’s curator-in-residence Elham Puriya Mehr and dive into the heart of coffeehouse culture by participating in Coffeehouselabs events at Griffin Art Project throughout January 2024. Curated by Elham Puriya Mehr, an independent curator based in Vancouver, this four-week residency delves into Puriya Mehr's curatorial research ‘The Third Space: The Affective Atmosphere of Coffeehouses’. She positions coffeehouses on the border of fiction and non-fiction to encourage our imagination about the abilities of these social spaces for the not-yet. The research concentrates on the potentialities of 'joy' and 'collective conversation' against the biopolitics of 'happiness' defined by capitalism. 

For the first event, Elham will present her video titled ‘The Third Space: The Affective Atmosphere of Coffeehouses,’ in which she unravels the intricate layers, affective atmosphere, and specters of the coffeehouse as a ‘third space.’ Following this presentation, she will delve into her insightful research on the potentiality of coffeehouses as alternative learning spaces that foster events. She invites us to this journey to historical coffeehouses in Iran and England, to collectively reflect on the 'biopolitics of happiness,' and explore resistant strategies.

Elham Puriya Mehr wishes to thank Canada Council for their support of her residency project.