Lecture: Visions of the Modern: Abstraction in the Postcolonial Middle East

After 1945, abstract art exploded in the Arab world, announcing a new cultural renaissance. In this talk, Pepe Karmel, Associate Professor of Art History, NYU, will link the different varieties of Arab abstraction to their counterparts in the broader Middle East and in Europe—and discuss how these varieties served as vehicles for competing visions of Arab modernity rooted in histories and experiences unique to each nation.

*Offered in conjunction with Taking Shape: Abstraction from the Arab World, 1950s-1980s, on view at the Grey Art Gallery, New York University, 100 Washington Square East, NYC, January 14–April 4, 2020.

Taking Shape: Abstraction from the Arab World, 1950s–1980s traces the emergence and development of abstraction in the Arab world through paintings, sculptures, and works on paper dating from the 1950s through the 1980s. Drawn from the collection of the Barjeel Art Foundation based in Sharjah, UAE, the exhibition features nearly 90 works by a diverse group of artists, including Etel Adnan, Shakir Hassan Al Said, Kamal Boullata, Huguette Caland, Ahmed Cherkaoui, Saloua Raouda Choucair, Rachid Koraïchi, and Hassan Sharif, among others. Taking Shape reveals how artists moved away from figuration toward a process of simplifying and schematizing reality—an approach initiated by both artist collectives as well as by individual practitioners in the region and the Arab diaspora. Accompanying the exhibition will be a fully illustrated publication featuring new scholarship.

Free of charge, no reservations, capacity limited, and subject to change. Photo ID required for entrance to NYU buildings.

Co-sponsored by Grey Art Gallery and NYU’s Department of Art History.