Essays by Martin Daughtry, Walter Mignolo and Octavio Zaya accompany works from all series to date, where graphic patterning attests alternately to violence and moments of agency, community and escape.
About the Artist
The vital practice of Hayv Kahraman produces ethereal figures relating to each other in complex grounds. Their grace belies the brutal history of violence and displacement Kahraman’s subjects endure, creating an oscillating effect that entices the viewer with its seductive order. The artist combines elements of Italian Renaissance painting and twelfth-century Baghdadi illuminated manuscripts to create an evocative, hybrid vocabulary. Her quietly radical shifts—where traditional Iraqi screens’ geometric patterns are replaced with sections of a woman’s body, or a manuscript figure is presented as doll-like parts—convey the artist’s developing exploration of femininity, acculturation and abstract patterns.
Kahraman was among the Jameel Prize 5 shortlisted artists and designers. The exhibition was on view at Jameel Arts Centre from April 25 to September 14, 2019.
About the Contributors
Martin Daughtry is Associate Professor of Music at New York University.
Walter Mignolo is Distinguished Professor of Romance Studies at Duke University.
Octavio Zaya is an independent writer, art critic and curator living in New York City since 1978.
About the Publisher
An imprint of Rizzoli New York launched in January 2018, Rizzoli Electa is an imprint dedicated to Rizzoli’s museum and exhibitions publishing in collaboration with leading Italian book publisher and sister company Mondadori Electa.
