The Soft Edge of the Blade Vol. 3

Statement:

Zaal  Art Gallery, in collaboration with Leila Heller Gallery, proudly presents Soft  Edge of the Blade Vol. 3, on view from November 11 to January 8.

Following  acclaimed presentations in London (2022) and Toronto (2023), Soft Edge of the Blade returns for its third edition—this time in Dubai.

Continuing its inquiry into the many faces of violence, this series turns its gaze to the region where the very notion of “the Middle East” has been shaped through a  vocabulary of conflict.

But here, in this third act, the exhibition proposes something quieter, more persistent: What if the violence we fear is already within us—codified in language, tradition, memory, and even beauty? 

Soft Edge of the Blade Vol. 3 brings together the works of nine contemporary Iranian artists whose practices span painting, sculpture, photography, and graphic forms.

Together, they offer a multifaceted exploration of violence not as spectacle, but as residue—soft, systemic, and often unseen.

This edition revisits and re-questions the themes explored in the previous shows: the forms of symbolic, hidden, and insidious violence that emerge through diaspora, gender, family structures, censorship, and the burden of history.