Without Boundary

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(1)Arts. Without Boundary. C O U R T E S Y T H E A R T I S T A N D G A G O S I A N G A L L E R Y, N E W Y O R K. Ghada Amer (b. 1963 in Cairo, Egypt, lives and works in New York). Eight Women in Black and White, 2004 Acrylic, embroidery and gel medium on canvas 7’ x 6’ 4” (213.4 x 193 cm). P R I VAT E C O L L E C T I O N , C O U R T E S Y V I C T O R I A M I R O G A L L E R Y, L O N D O N. Seventeen Ways of Looking “Islamic or not”. The Museum of Modern Art in New York (www.moma.org) exhibits seventeen artists who come from the “Islamic” world but do not live there. Depictions here show two perspectives used in Without Boundary to defy the binary oppositions of current politics by resisting essentialist notions of who they are such as: “Islamic or not.” First, Ghada Amer looks at “Islamic art” as a matter of identity and, in particular, the relationship between gender and identity. While this often entails a focus on women wearing veils, Amer tries to undermine this expectation by depicting nude and near-nude women. Her Eight Women in Black and White (2004) are actually veiled by embroidery, tangles of thread, and the different layers of stitching. Eight Women expresses her opposition to the attempts of fundamentalists or feminists to make the female body asexual. Secondly, Raqib Shaw’s Garden of Earthly Delights III (2003) is inspired by the Garden of Delights of the Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch, but Shaw also draws from other sources such as Japanese Hokusai prints and traditional Persian Miniatures. It breathes in a permissive and celebratory way the generation of new, hybrid possibilities. (Description based upon an excerpt from the publication Without Boundary: Seventeen Ways of Looking “Islamic or Not” by Fereshteh Daftari, 2006). Raqib Shaw (b. 1974 in Calcutta, India, lives and works in London). The Garden of Earthly Delights III, 2003 Mixed media on board. Three panels, overall: 10 x 15’ (305 x 407.5 cm), each panel: 10 x 5’ (305 x 152.5 cm). ISIM REVIEW 17 / SPRING 2006. 67.

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