14 Nov - 5 Dec, 2022
Statement:
In this duo exhibition organized by Residency Unlimited and the Artistic Freedom Initiative, the visual artists Faten Gaddes and Nazanin Noroozi reflect upon notions of displacement, tragedy, and instability.
Nazanin’s delicately rendered prints and hand made paper works feature images combining private and super8 family photographs from her childhood in Iran with found imagery of environmental catastrophes, and man-made disasters. The artist questions archives as modes of cultural transmission and historical memory, and invites the viewer to enter into fragmented narratives based on images gone viral such as the downing of the PS752 flight by the Iranian government, Beirut’s blast in 2020, and the U.S air force clearance of Afghanistan in 2021.
Faten presents photographs of the remnants of an installation she realized in Tunisia a decade ago. Titled “Punching-Ball”, it denounced violence against women. Deemed blasphemous, it was burned down by a religious extremists group. Two years later, Faten left for the US with, in her personal belongings, an envelope containing three small pieces of burned polyester fabric which was all that was left from the installation. “It took me ten years to accept it, to be in the present, to understand, die a little, lose myself, come back, cry, howl, speak, observe, seek, find, hide, tear, glue, melt, disappear, continue, then lose myself again, heal a little and perhaps be reborn…”
Ace Hotel Brooklyn | 252 Schermerhorn St | Brooklyn | New York | USA
Artists