Speaking of Art

What role have artists played in dismantling colonial infrastructures? In what ways have they contributed to creating new platforms in the postcolonial era? What can we learn about forging solidarities through art from past generations? In this episode, Hoor Al Qasimi speaks with Morad Montazami, who co-curated The Casablanca Art School: Platforms and Patterns for a Postcolonial Avant-Garde (1962–1987) with Madeleine de Colnet, abo...

Join Natasha Ginwala as she explores one of Lala Rukh’s works from her iconic series, River In An Ocean, and how it captures the diverse rhythms of life and landscape with a minimalist vocabulary of lines, symbols and blackness.

Backstory is available in both audio and video formats. To view this episode in video, click here.

CREDITS

Host: Natasha Ginwala

Artwork: River In An Ocean: 6 (1993) and Moonscape (2010 / 2012) by Lala Rukh

Lala Rukh was one of the most significant artists of her generation. Her practice encompassed drawing, printmaking, photography and video, developed against the backdrop of political turmoil and feminist movements in Pakistan. Yet, despite her expansive four-decade artistic, pedagogical and political career that has influenced generations in Pakistan and beyond, she has remained an enigmatic figure. Join Hoor Al Qasimi and Natasha ...

Join Elizabeth Giorgis as she tells us about some of the symbols and imagery that appear in Melkamzer’s paintings, such as faces, vines, suns and moons, to gain insight into reading telsem. 

Backstory is available in both audio and video formats. To view this episode in video, click here.

CREDITS

Host: Elizabeth Giorgis

Artwork: Untitled  (year) by Henok Melkamzer.

Producers: Jyoti Dhar, Kamayani Sharma and Mahshid Rafiei.

Film...

How do artistic practices traverse across generations? How do they continue to address critical conditions in our present moment? In our latest episode, Hoor Al Qasimi speaks with curator Elizabeth Giorgis about the work of artist Henok Melkamzer, one of the most prolific practitioners of the Ethiopian art form called telsem. Melkamzer talks to Giorgis about his journey and process. Drawing from astrology, religion and spirituality...

In this episode of Backstory, curator and art historian Salah Hassan elaborates on the historical significance of Untitled (1990), a painting by Gavin Jantjes, and how it contributes to the discourse and representation of African and African Diaspora art.

Backstory is available in both audio and video formats. To view this episode in video, click here.

CREDITS

Host: Salah M Hassan. 

Artwork: Untitled  (1990) by Gavin Janjtes.

P...

What does a sustained engagement with art and activism allow for? How can radical cultural practice forge solidarities across different communities, geographies and temporalities? Join Hoor Al Qasimi in conversation with curator Salah M. Hassan and artist Gavin Jantjes on the occasion of ‘To Be Free! A Retrospective 1970–2023’. Together, the guests explore the artist’s five-decade practice committed to furthering Black liberation––...

Join curator Omar Kholeif as he walks us through the formal and contextual dimensions of a newly imagined presentation of ‘Zanzibar’ (1998–2023), a series of paintings by Lubaina Himid situated within a distinct sound installation created in collaboration with Magda Stawarska.

Backstory is available in both audio and video formats. To watch the video on YouTube, click here.

CREDITS

Host

Omar Kholeif

Artwork

Lubaina Himid and Magda ...

How do visual and sonic forms shape our understanding of a place? How do memories unfold when we encounter these forms in new configurations? In this episode, Hoor Al Qasimi speaks with Turner Prize winning artist Lubaina Himid and Magda Stawarska, known for her practice of ‘inner listening’, about their long-standing collaborative practice. Together, they discuss concepts of restlessness, belonging and recognition evoked by the se...

Backstory explores the story behind an artwork, including its conception, context and meaning in the world. Join curator Omar Kholeif as he speaks about ‘Leave to Cool’ (2020), a painting by Lubaina Himid, to learn more about the significance of its imagery, materiality and history.

Backstory is available in both audio and video formats.

To watch the video on YouTube, click here.

CREDITS

Host

Omar Kholeif

Artwork

Lubaina Himid, Le...

How do the concepts of home, longing and belonging resonate through works by artists Etel Adnan, Lubaina Himid, Rashed Aereen and Saloua Rouda Choucair? In this episode, Hoor Al Qasimi speaks with curator Omar Kholeif about the themes that percolate through the exhibition ‘In the Heart of Another Country: The Diasporic Imagination Rises’, an extensive presentation of works from the Sharjah Art Foundation Collection, which took plac...