The penultimate scene in the series is the assassin’s public hanging conceived as a grand Baroque triptych. The bloody, Christlike figure of Mirza Riza hangs limply at the center; a velvet-roped stanchion below helps hold back the assembly of onlookers who crowd the two side panels. Segregated by gender, the mob, many of whom with distraught faces, experience the execution in an entirely contemporary manner—through cell phone cameras—except for a single blind man, who seems unaware of the fateful event.
