Shirazeh Houshiary

September 8 - October 23, 1999
540 West 26th Street

Press Release

Lehmann Maupin is pleased to announce an exhibition by Shirazeh Houshiary. She has exhibited her sculptures, paintings and drawings widely since the 1980s, and this exhibition will consist of a new body of paintings and will be the first one person exhibition of Houshiary's work in New York.

Born in Iran in 1955 and having moved to London in the early 1970s, Houshiary graduated from the Chelsea School of Art in 1979 and emerged with a group of artists including Tony Cragg, Richard Deacon, and Anish Kapoor. Shirazeh Houshiary has had one person exhibitions at the Musée Rath in Geneva, the Museum of Modern Art Oxford, the Camden Arts Centre in London, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, the Harn Museum in Gainsville Florida, Le Magasin in Grenoble, the Museum Villa Stuck in Munich, and the Bonnefanten Museum in Maastricht among others. Nominated in 1994 by the Tate Gallery for the Turner Prize, she continues to live and work in London.

This new group of paintings is born of Houshiary's dedication to and interest in Sufism. Each painting is built up of delicate webs of graphite or pigment on either a black or a white field. Text taken from Sufi incantations are repeatedly laced into luminous surfaces, uniting the word and the image into a meditative visual experience.

Artists in this exhibition

Press

Exhibition Works

Black light, 1998
black aquacryl with silverpoint and graphite on canvas
74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches
190 x 190 cm
LM1492
Black light, 1998 black aquacryl with silverpoint and graphite on canvas 74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches 190 x 190 cm LM1492

White shadow, 1998
white aquacryl with silverpoint and graphite on canvas
74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches
190 x 190 cm
LM1495
White shadow, 1998 white aquacryl with silverpoint and graphite on canvas 74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches 190 x 190 cm LM1495

Breath, 1999
black aquacryl and graphite on canvas
27 1/2 x 27 1/2 inches
70 x 70 cm
LM1500
Breath, 1999 black aquacryl and graphite on canvas 27 1/2 x 27 1/2 inches 70 x 70 cm LM1500

Luminous darkness, 1998
white aquacryl with pigment and pencil on canvas
74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches
190 x 190 cm
LM1487
Luminous darkness, 1998 white aquacryl with pigment and pencil on canvas 74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches 190 x 190 cm LM1487

Touch, 1999
black aquacryl and graphite on canvas
11 x 11 inches
28 x 28 cm
LM1503
Touch, 1999 black aquacryl and graphite on canvas 11 x 11 inches 28 x 28 cm LM1503

Dust, 1998
white aquacryl with pigment and pencil on canvas
27 1/2 x 27 1/2 inches
70 x 70 cm
LM1497
Dust, 1998 white aquacryl with pigment and pencil on canvas 27 1/2 x 27 1/2 inches 70 x 70 cm LM1497

Warp and weft, 1999
white aquacryl and pencil on canvas
27 1/2 x 27 1/2 inches
70 x 70 cm
LM1499
Warp and weft, 1999 white aquacryl and pencil on canvas 27 1/2 x 27 1/2 inches 70 x 70 cm LM1499

Brittle moment, 1998
white aquacryl with silverpoint and graphite on canvas
74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches
190 x 190 cm
LM1494
Brittle moment, 1998 white aquacryl with silverpoint and graphite on canvas 74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches 190 x 190 cm LM1494

Penumbra, 1999
white aquacryl with pigment and pencil on canvas
74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches
190 x 190 cm
LM1486
Penumbra, 1999 white aquacryl with pigment and pencil on canvas 74 8/10 x 74 8/10 inches 190 x 190 cm LM1486

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