The artist
My name is Cocovan,
© Romain Boutin
I’m a 34 years old French-Iranian performance artist and former pop musician. I was born and raised in Paris, where I began my artistic journey as a Pop singer at 16, and eventually relocated to the USA in 2010 to pursue my music dreams. After a 10 year career in music - releasing multiple EPs, touring internationally, and working with Pop’s biggest names, I decided to start exploring beyond sound, and with a different art form: performance art.
In 2016, I began “Poetic Interventions” – a series of public art performances-installations. Set up directly in the street, the 8 hour ephemeral pieces, always poetic and dreamy, are meant to enchant the urban environment and disrupt the daily routine with unexpected beauty. Meeting instant success, I decided to put my music career on hold to focus solely on performance art, and take these installations all around the world. Whether sitting on the moon on Paris's infamous Pont des Arts, covering Venice Beach with petals, or laying down on a bed in the streets of London, I’d like to remind everyone that poetry can be found anywhere, especially where you wouldn't think to look.
One of those public installations spontaneously evolved into the ongoing art project, "The World Letter" - as explained on the “about” page.
My works have been performed/exhibited at Art Basel Miami 2017, the Cannes Film Festival 2018, Refinery 29’ 29 Rooms in NY and Los Angeles, “bright” group show in Los Angeles 2019, at l’Alliance Française (FIAF) in NYC, Casey Neistat’s 368 studio in NYC,
My works have been featured in Billboard, Noisey, LA Weekly, Konbini, Perez Hilton, Konbini, DAZED, PAPER Magazine, Paste Magazine, LA Weekly, Artnet, Refinery 29, France Info, etc.
I have given a TEDx talk at Columbia University, and spoken at the UN headquarters in NYC, or as part of the JED Foundation story sharing program, among other.
I am based between NYC and Paris.
Public speaking
Cocovan is a TEDx speaker, and has given public talks at the UN Headquarters in NYC, the JED Foundation in NYC, and lectures in schools and universties around the world including Columbia University in NYC, Sciences Po Paris, and the University of Lviv in Ukraine. She tells the extraordinary journey of how she went from pop singer to traveling the world with a giant love letter... And the many discoveries she made about humanity along the way!
What can we learn about the world from 25,000 love letters from humanity?
“The World Is Full Of Love” TEDx Columbia University, NYC, NY USA (2019)