3 Years of Heavy Feelings: An Interview with Parissa Charghi

PARISSA CHARGHI is an Iranian multidisciplinary artist known for her work as a graphic designer, creative director & producer, vinyl selector, and founder of Heavy Feelings, based in Cologne. 

In her curation, she champions emerging artists and cultivates spaces rooted in collaboration, authenticity, and wide-reaching representation. In 2022, she founded HEAVY FEELINGS, a platform for emerging and exceptional talents in the music scene, which focuses on events, media productions, and cultural interactions. Through her work with the platform, Heavy Feelings has been able to build a vibrant community and create a broad repertoire of artists across different backgrounds and genres. 

Later this month, on the 28th of February, Refuge Worldwide teams up with Heavy Feelings to take over the Annex room of Wuppertal’s Open Ground Club, activating its revered sound system for a shared night of music. Ahead of the collaboration, we caught up with Parissa to learn about the ethos behind Heavy Feelings, what she is looking forward to, and the roots that continue to shape her journey.

Photo by Parissa Charghi, Cologne 2026

I’d love to hear about the Heavy Feelings magazine project and the archive. The photos online already look brilliant.

The magazine was released last year and marked a major milestone for all of us. I chose not to share many images online — it’s something meant to be experienced physically. Creating a magazine comes directly from my background in graphic design and print. I studied graphic design two decades ago, and self-publishing has always been my preferred way of communicating, far removed from digital media.

The idea for the magazine grew out of the amount of documentation we had gathered. By “we,” I mean a small collective that formed organically. When I started Heavy Feelings in 2022, a group of young photographers and filmmakers began attending the events and shooting mostly on analog film. We stayed connected, and over time their work became an essential part of the visual language and archival documentation of HF.

After about three years, we had built up a huge archive, and I started wondering what it all meant. There were so many strong images and thoughtful moments. Sometimes a single photograph can communicate far more than typed words.

Photo by GG PINATA, D´MONK Video Production, Cologne 2023

Bringing everything together was a conscious step toward presenting our work independently and translating it into print. I think of it as an archive and a manifesto, once something is printed, it becomes tangible, owned, and part of a historical record. The publication includes written texts and a detailed index for every image, providing context, dates and background for each moment captured. It’s about preserving the moment and the path as a collective echo, a way of making our shared experiences and entanglements feel lasting and timeless.

The connection between analog photography and print feels really important.

That connection between analog photography and print feels essential to me. I appreciate digital spaces too — our website is built like a Tumblr page, and I genuinely enjoy that format. But holding something in your hands creates a different kind of presence than seeing it on a screen or a domain. It's more tangible and monumental.

Photo by SMIKI / Internationale Photoszene Köln, Open Talk with HF 2024

So much of this work sounds like it's rooted in collaboration. What does collaboration mean to you?

Collaboration has always shaped the way I work, long before Heavy Feelings. I was already active in music culture, working with labels and artists, but the practice only felt complete once the collaborations developed into deeper creative exchanges and a shared understanding of the work, such as directing a short film for Ray Lozano’s album Pairing Mode or designing album artworks for various artists.

Heavy Feelings grew from this belief in “creating and fluid synergies.” I value collaboration because it brings different perspectives together and leads to stronger, more meaningful results. While I’m confident in my own creative practice, I don’t believe in hierarchy. The goal is the most compelling body of work possible, and that requires shared perspectives.

For me, collaboration is about valuable exchanges. I work with people whose work resonates with mine and where there is potential for long-term development, which is why I gradually stepped away from short-term pitching. Partnerships need to extend beyond a single event, and the same applies to artists: people return, rituals develop, and a sense of community forms. It becomes a shared, communal space, a conscious response to short-term culture and fast consumption.

Photos by MAKAYABUNDO / HF x InnerCity Expressions, Berlin 2023 | HF at King Georg, Cologne 2023

What makes Heavy Feelings important as a community space today?

Community sits at the core of what Heavy Feelings represents. Today, aesthetics often take priority while substance and depth come second. I grew up experiencing music differently, and in Cologne, there are many mainstream scenes and closed bubbles but fewer spaces where music lovers truly come together.

Heavy Feelings was never meant to be a scene to consume, it became a space to belong to. I book live musicians, vocalists, DJs and producers with a clear focus on the music itself. People return because they trust my taste, even when they don’t know the artists yet. That trust feels like confirmation.

The aesthetic of Heavy Feelings grew alongside the people who shaped it. Creatives, friends and collaborators like Mina Amiri (Filmmaker & Photographer), Tembela Toto Kiesa (Photographer), Ugly Goethe (Photographer & Poet), Özben Önal (Writer & Journalist) SMIKI (Producer & Photographer), MAKAYABUNDO (Photographer & Creative), GHOSTY (Videographer & Allrounder), GG PINATA (Photographer) and many others helped turn it from an idea into a living community. Their contribution, energy and presence continue to define what Heavy Feelings feels like.

That authenticity is something people genuinely recognize and keep coming back for.

Photos by SMIKI: SALOMEA at Silvan Strauss Live at Clouds Hill Studios, 2024 Hamburg | HF, 2023 Cologne

Beyond the events that HF regularly hosts in Cologne, what other projects has the platform undertaken?

Heavy Feelings has gradually grown into a wider ecosystem that extends our curatorial methodology beyond the club space.

Alongside events, we run home recording sessions and ongoing creative development through editorials, photo shoots, and video productions. All visual and audiovisual work is produced from within the collective, allowing our visual language and storytelling to grow organically from the people involved rather than being outsourced. Working closely across music, photography, video, design, and writing naturally leads to a more diverse and open creative output that continues to evolve across formats.

Open calls play an important role in this process for example. We regularly invite musicians, DJs, and producers to share their work and become part of future lineups, creating entry points for longer collaborations rather than short-term exposure.

Photos by MAKAYABUNDO / HF x InnerCity Expressions, Berlin 2023 | HF at King Georg, Cologne 2023

We have also initiated research-based formats such as the MARKK Museum (Hamburg) Vinyl Sampling Residency with producer Persian Empire in 2024, a five-day residency centred on archive research, sampling, and historical listening practices.

Our ecosystem includes community involvement in shoots and productions, physical outputs such as merchandise and the Heavy Feelings photo magazine, pop-up stores in Cologne and Berlin in collaboration with HHV, and special projects like hosting Silvan Strauss live at Clouds Hill Studio in Hamburg around the release of his latest album.

Over time, this way of working has developed into an approach to the discovery of new forms of expression. Many collaborators return and continue to grow alongside the platform, while new connections emerge between artists and creatives themselves.

Heavy Feelings increasingly takes place beyond Cologne through collaborations and ongoing relationships with artists and creatives based in cities such as Berlin and London. Maintaining these connections has become an important part of the practice, allowing the platform to remain locally rooted while continuously expanding beyond its immediate surroundings.

Connecting people, sharing resources, and building long-term creative relationships has become a central part of what we do.

You often talk about building your own table. What does that mean to you?

Building my own table means creating opportunities instead of waiting for permission. As an Iranian woman, a mother and a self-employed creative, I’ve spent more than 15 years navigating structures that often felt limiting and hierarchical (and still are).

Heavy Feelings began as something small and personal, and gradually expanded into productions, films and research-based formats. One example was the sampling residency at the MARKK Museum in Hamburg, where we documented the art of sampling together with producer Persian Empire and the wider collective. I organized every part of it — from housing and transport to production. That’s what building your own table means to me: independence and self-determination. No one can take it away from me. A form of liberation and personal resistance.

Photos by UGLY GOETHE, Vinyl Sampling Residency, HH 2023

What does three years of Heavy Feelings mean to you?

Three years of Heavy Feelings feels like watching your garden grow in real time. Planting many different seeds and slowly witnessing what takes root, develops, and begins to bear fruit. I’m proud not only of my own journey, but of everyone who has been part of it. People have developed their own projects, started collectives, released music and gained confidence along the way.

That growth is the greatest reward, more than money or recognition. And I’m still learning too. It feels like this is only the beginning and there’s much more ahead.

Top: Photos by MINA AMIRI, HF at Bilker Bunker, Düsseldorf 2024 /Bottom: Photo by LUDOVIC SCHULD, RIAA BAR, Closing Residency, Hamburg 2024

How does music shape you personally?

Music has always been central to my life. I grew up in a traditional Iranian household where weekends meant large family gatherings filled with music, dancing and joy. Memories that shaped my relationship to sound early on. With two older sisters, I was surrounded by Prince and 80s/90s Icons, and I spent hours making mixtapes and recording imaginary radio shows.

In my early twenties, collecting records deepened that connection. I’m drawn to the physicality of vinyl: the artwork, the sound, the ritual of listening. I’m very sensitive to music; when it resonates, I can completely lose myself in it. When it doesn’t, I really can’t take it. Heavy Feelings grew from that sensitivity. It’s personal, but it resonates widely. People who attend understand the atmosphere: present, positive, and fully immersed in the music.

How do jazz and hip hop inform your work?

Cologne has a strong legacy of jazz, followed by hip hop and reggae scenes in the 90s and 2000s, which shaped my environment and led me into underground collectives and subcultural spaces.

For me, jazz and hip hop are inseparable from their histories. Black American Music emerged from African American communities in the early 20th century, and hip hop was created by Black and Latino youth in the Bronx in the 1970s, responding to racism, economic neglect and urban inequality. Engaging with this music means acknowledging the histories of struggle, creativity and liberation that shaped it.

This awareness shapes how the space is experienced and presented by the community and artists themselves, not as a political statement, but as a shared understanding of the roots and context of the music. Creating a space where people from many different backgrounds come together to build something collectively.

Photo by SMIKI, HF, Cologne 2024

When did collecting become selecting for you?

It started around my time at Refuge, where I began selecting more seriously alongside hosting radio shows. I never set out to become a DJ, I simply wanted to play my records.

Selecting is a deliberate process: packing the record case, listening through everything again and deciding what fits the moment. There’s no screen or display to rely on: you have to listen! I choose my gigs carefully so they align with my vision and the space, and when I’m booked, people know they’re getting a thoughtful, intentional selection shaped for that specific occasion.

There’s a sense of curiosity around what’s in my record case and what the next choice will be, and in those moments I’m fully present, totally lost in the music, playing for the universe I'm in and letting that energy carry through the room. Sometimes people Shazam what I’m playing, and I just show them the record directly.

How are you feeling ahead of Open Ground?

Collaborating with Refuge feels like a full-circle moment. It’s where I first began selecting and where people offered me space without me even asking, something that naturally grew into a lasting friendship.

Open Ground is equally special for its dedication to sound, hospitality and details. I love playing dub and reggae there because the system allows me to bring those records I wouldn’t play anywhere else, from Flying Lotus to more experimental producer work. People don’t expect it, but it works.

Every collaboration I take on is a conscious decision. It’s not about combining names, but about shared values, mutual respect and doing things with intention. I’m not a big club person, but when I know we’re playing at Open Ground, I know it’s right.

Photo by CC MORGAN, JUMBI PECKHAM, 2023 London

---

Tickets for the Open Ground Clubnight are available here