DOCUMENTARY
ARCHITECT
Reconstructing what was meant to disappear.
A former detainee rebuilds a prison from memory—turning testimony into architecture, and memory into evidence.
Written and Directed by Elahe Zivardar
Feature Documentary · In Production
OVERVIEW
A prison rebuilt from memory. A life rebuilt in fragments.
Memory becomes the only blueprint.
Elahe reconstructs a detention prison from fragments—architectural logic, testimonies, and archival traces—assembling a digital environment of a place that was never meant to be fully seen.
As former detainees contribute their recollections, the model shifts and expands. It becomes a contested space where memory, trauma, and truth are continuously negotiated.
Spanning twelve years and multiple displacements, Architect follows this evolving structure as both a method of survival and an attempt to recover what was designed to disappear.
Synopsis
After surviving six years in offshore detention (2013–2019), Elahe begins reconstructing the prison from memory. Drawing on architectural logic, testimonies from former detainees, and fragments of archival footage, she builds a detailed digital simulation of a place deliberately obscured from public view.
As others enter the reconstruction with their own memories, the model evolves beyond documentation. Contradictions emerge, spaces shift, and the architecture itself becomes unstable—reflecting the fractured nature of memory and the difficulty of establishing a single, fixed truth.
Following her release, Elahe spends six years in the United States (2019–2025), moving from Los Angeles to Washington, DC, and then to Phoenix. While attempting to rebuild her life and complete the film, she faces ongoing precarity, systemic barriers, and repeated interruption. Confronted with escalating hostility toward migrants and targeted discrimination against Iranians, she is ultimately forced to leave.
Relocating to Australia with the unfinished film, she continues the reconstruction—carrying both the project and its unresolved histories across borders.
Spanning twelve years, *Architect* traces a search for justice, belonging, and a form through which memory can resist erasure. Animated sequences of Elahe’s artworks are woven throughout, forming a core part of the film’s visual and emotional language.
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Director’s Statement
This film began in silence.
Not as a decision, but as a condition.
I was drawn to what remains when structure dissolves —
when space, memory, and identity no longer align.
It is psychological. Emotional. Fragile.
Architect is a study of that collapse.
Of displacement. Of endurance.
Of the invisible systems that shape how we exist.
There is no narration to guide you.
Only presence. Only time.
— Elahe Zivardar
Context
First developed as a short film in 2021,
Searching for Aramasayesh Gah marked the beginning of this work.
It has since evolved into the feature-length film Architect.
The project has been explored through academic and journalistic platforms, including Oxford Border Criminologies and Forbes.