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Unveiled: New Art from the Middle East
The Saatchi Gallery aims to provide an innovative forum for contemporary art, presenting work by largely unseen young artists or by established international artists whose work has been rarely or never exhibited in the UK.
The current show Unveiled: New Art From the Middle East, presents work by some of the region's most exciting artists. In recent years the contemporary art scene in Cairo, Tehran, Beirut, Jordan and Dubai has become more vibrant and active than ever before and an extraordinarily diverse range of artistic expression is now emerging from the Middle East and its Diaspora.
In Ghost, a large installation of a group of Muslim women in prayer, Attia renders their bodies as vacant shells, empty hoods devoid of personhood or spirit. Made from tin foil - a domestic, throw away material - Attia’s figures become alien and futuristic, synthesising the abject and divine. Bowing in shimmering meditation, their ritual is equally seductive and hollow, questioning modern ideologies - from religion to nationalism and consumerism - in relation to individual identity, social perception, devotion and exclusion. Attia’s Ghost evokes contemplation of the human condition as vulnerable and mortal; his impoverished materials suggest alternative histories or understandings of the world, manifest in individual and temporal experience. Other artists in Unveiled: New Art From the Middle East: Diana Al-Hadid | Halim Al-Karim | Ahmed Alsoudani | Kader Attia | Nadia Ayari | Ali Banisadr | Shirin Fakhim | Shadi Ghadirian | Barbad Golshiri | Ramin Haerizadeh | Rokni Haerizadeh | Khaled Hafez | Wafa Hourani | Hayv Kahraman | Jeffar Khaldi | Laleh Khorramian | Farsad Labbauf |Tala Madani | Ahmad Morshedloo | Sara Rahbar | Marwan Rechmaoui | http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/unveiled/ The Saatchi Gallery
Duke of York's HQ, King's Road
Chelsea, London, SW3 4SQ, U.K.
Exhibition Unveiled : New Art from the Middle East
Jan 30th - May 9th 2009 Closed: Saturday 21st & Sunday 22nd February 2009
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