article review:

What is the topic and why is it relevant to the class?

• What are the main issues related to class and raised in the article/news piece?

• Was a particular point of view taken? How was it legitimated or justified?

• State something critical but constructive about the reading. Do you think that the issue being covered is important, controversial, worthy of attention? Do you agree with the author? If so, how? If not, why not? Did anything bother you about it? Was there, in your opinion, something missing? What would have made it “better”? What is a possible “next step”?

• 2-3 questions that you think would be good for generating class discussion

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Title: SHIRAZEH HOUSHIARY
Author(s): Donald Kuspit
Source: Artforum International. 38.3 (Nov. 1999): p142.
Document Type: Article
Full Text:

On entering Shirazeh Houshiary’s show, one saw what appeared to be a group of
monochromes–some black, some white, and all square–installed in contrasting
groups of large and small works. As one drew nearer to several of the paintings,
however, one began to discern the presence of Arabic texts (actually Sufist chants),
meticulously transcribed onto the canvas in graphite or pigment, where they
proliferate like coral. These inscriptions are clearly legible when examined up close
(the fact that they are incomprehensible to most Western readers only adds to their
exoticism), and evoke Muslim iconography. From any distance, the work seems to
illustrate perfectly Robert Motherwell’s observation that abstract painting is a form of
mysticism. But just as important, Houshiary has produced convincing monochrome
field paintings that refine and intensify “post-painterly abstraction” to uncanny new
perceptual effect.

Kenneth Noland seems a particular, if oblique, influence on Houshiary, as suggested
by the circular imagery in a number of works–in Luminous darkness, 1998, the
center is marked by a yellowish bull’s-eye–and by the highly nuanced surface. Even
more crucially, at least from my point of view, Houshiary’s paintings are unabashedly
aesthetic, indeed beautiful. Under the auspices of religious idealism, these works
become formally ideal. Like abstraction, beauty has also been thought to have
mystical import, that is, regarded as a mode of transcendence and self-recovery.
Houshiary’s works restore spiritual feeling to abstract painting, which, under
Greenberg’s ministrations, had become mindlessly materialistic. As titles such as
Brittle Moment, Presence, and Veil indicate, Houshiary’s canvases seem to “picture” a
perceptual epiphany–the moment that spirit becomes manifest and one realizes that
there is a center to existence and to one’s being.

Houshiary’s titles make clear as well that she is in pursuit of what has traditionally
been called the sublime; for her, beauty is its surface. The physical experience of
approaching her paintings, then, is in effect a spiritual experience, that is, a process
of initiation and revelation. From a distance they look like blank slates; as one gets
closer one sees the more or less clear mandala-like, peculiarly dense form embedded
in their seemingly amorphous surface; and up close one discovers the intricate,
excited, minute detail. The emerging center comes to represent the ritualized
concentration necessary for inner illumination. Equally important, from a purely
painting point of view, Houshiary’s works show a patient perfectionism that seems
increasingly rare today, and thus all the more admirable.

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–Donald Kuspit

Source Citation
Kuspit, Donald. “SHIRAZEH HOUSHIARY.” Artforum International 38.3 (1999): 142.
Academic OneFile. Web. 17 Jan. 2012.

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Perspectives

Contemporary Art in the Middle East

s t e p h a n i e c o t e l a t a n n e r

T
he United Arab Emirates are now a
centre of cultural activity as coun-
tries invest billions of dollars to

compete in the race to become the cultural
hub of the Middle East. Abu Dhabi’s plan
is to construct branches of the Louvre and
Guggenheim museums on Saadiyat Island,
and the city is responsible for promoting
Art Paris Abu Dhabi Fair. Dubai boasts 50
galleries, hosted its inaugural art fair, Art
Dubai, and has welcomed auction houses
Christie’s and Bonhams. Sharjah is host-
ing its ninth Biennial in March 2009, once
again offering a space large enough to
encompass blockbuster-sized exhibitions.

Qatar’s largest city, Doha, opened an
Islamic art museum, designed by I M Pei
(Louvre Pyramid, Paris 1989; Bank of China
Tower, Hong Kong 1989) in late 2008 and
is home to Sotheby’s first international
sales series in the Middle East. In January
2009, the recently opened Beirut Art
Centre, designed by Lebanese-based archi-
tect Raed Abillama, held its first show,
Closer, which consisted of internationally
recognised artists who are from the region.
Tehran is increasingly becoming the hot-

spot for galleries and Iran is the one
country that is generating a lot of interest
in collecting terms. Its broad buyer demo-
graphic includes international buyers as
well as Iranians, and works by Iranian
artists are dominating auction sales.

Challenged by the global financial
crisis, which is triggering a decline in the
price of oil, and the close proximity to
nations of military and political instability,
transforming themselves into cultural and
artistic meccas is an enormous under-
taking for Middle East countries; if they
can pull it off, it will be an accomplish-
ment of unprecedented proportions.

Short of travelling to the Middle East to
find out what has the art world stirring,
the recent exhibition Unveiled: New Art From
the Middle East at London’s Saatchi Gallery
was the next best thing. Saatchi got it right
by combining a diverse selection of artists,
regions and cultures. Themes ranged from
the effects of the 2006 Israeli attacks in
Beirut, as depicted by artist Marwan
Rechmaoui’s replicated abandoned apart-
ment building, to a typical Iranian wed-
ding painted by Rokni Haerizadeh. Saatchi

has a knack for throwing it all together
and letting the art speak for itself.

The works on display fell into three
categories, addressing violence, gender,
faith or tradition. Tehran-based photogra-
pher Shadi Gahdirian investigates the
position of women in Iran by replacing
their faces with ordinary domestic objects
such as cheese graters, irons and sieves,
while Ramin Haerizadah appears semi-
naked, dressed in women’s clothing in a
series of photographs, ‘Men of Allah’, in
which he mocks anti-feminist attitudes
and female oppression. Lending an extra-
ordinary political punch to these works is
the fact that both artists are creating these
contentious works at home in Iran.

Berlin-based Iraqi artist Ahmed Alsou-
dani tackles the harsh subjects of suicide
bombings and torture in his painting, We Die
Out of Hand, referencing the horrors of Abu
Ghraib or Guantanamo Bay with his violent
brush strokes that depict hooded figures in
a chaotic battle scene. Palestinian artist

KaderAttia,Ghost,2007.Courtesy of the Saatchi
Gallery,London ^ KaderAttia,2009.

r 2009 the authors. journal compilation r 2009 bpl/aah volume 16 issue 4 november 2009 The ArtBook 15

Wafa Hourani’s installation, Qalandia 2067,
named after a refugee camp near Ramallah,
next to the notorious Qalandia Israeli
checkpoint, is depicted in a series of five
models. Hourani’s miniature refugee camp,
including an Israeli nightclub, is a post-war
prediction of Qalandia, 100 years after the
1967 war. Hourani told BBC TV’s ‘News-
night Review’ that he feels ‘responsible
somehow to work and present the image of
Palestine for the world . . . I believe in art and
I believe it is more strong than any weapon’.

What at first glance appears to be a
roomful of baked potatoes, is, upon closer
inspection, rows of kneeling aluminium
foil figures representing Muslim women at
prayer. Ghost by Paris-based Algerian artist
Kader Attia, is an appropriate name for this

installation since the foil figures are hollow
inside, leaving the bodies and expressions
of the women to the viewer’s imagination.

New York-based Syrian artist Diana Al-
Hadid’s abstract sculpture, Self Melt, draws
on Islamic art traditions by using geometric
forms intended to encourage contempla-
tion of God’s infinite wisdom. Hadid’s
work explores the correlation between
spirituality and science. Her large upside-
down sculptures are getting worldwide
attention. In the January issue of ARTnews
Hadid was featured as an ‘Artist to Watch’.

Fewer than half the 21 artists featured in
the show currently reside in the Middle East.
The majority live in key artistic hubs, such
as Paris, Berlin or New York, which begs the
question, is there any harm in lumping

them all together? Historically, the spread of
Islam homogenised the region spanning
from North Africa to Iran, including the
Persian Gulf, Levant and Turkey. The effects
of post-colonialism as well as the region’s
current relationship with the West are
necessary considerations for establishing a
dialogue about the characteristic differences
of individual Middle East countries.

In his keynote speech at Tate’s January
conference, ‘Infrastructures and Ideas’,
geographer David Elliot surmised that the
term ‘Middle East’ is an alternative to the
Western geographical conceptions of
‘Arab’ and ‘Islamic’. Cultural diversity was
the central theme throughout the sympo-
sium. On the academic side, Iraqi art
historian, Nada Shabout, argued for the
establishment of a relevant discourse and
methodology within which to discuss
artistic and cultural developments in the
Middle East. Artistically speaking, Western
influences on style, technique and media
are undeniably evident in the work exhib-
ited in ‘Unveiled’ and ultimately unavoid-
able, as the majority of the participating
artists live transnational lifestyles.

Commercially speaking, Henry Ho-
ward-Sneyd, Deputy Chairman of Sothe-
by’s Europe and Asia revealed that:

In the last three years Sotheby’s has seen a 2%
increase in Mideast buyers in sales worldwide,
which is indicative of a growing interest in the
Mideast throughout different fields. One of the
approaches that we have taken in Doha is to
bring forth a selection of art with the hope that
we are helping to make the Middle East become
part of the international scene. One of the
interesting things is that when you put Mideast
contemporary together with artists like Warhol or
Hirst it all works incredibly well together. It is not
about just selling Middle Eastern art but about
creating a potential international art center.

Charles Saatchi’s purchases are sure to
enhance artists’ careers as well as the Middle
East art market in general. Auction prices
for many Middle East artists are skyrocket-
ing and the cultural development in the
region will create new jobs for curators and
conservators, a rich market for dealers and
auction houses and unexplored territory for
artists. Perhaps the most inspiring aspect of
the emerging Middle East art market is the
idea that, through the creation of art and its
international accessibility, we can establish a
better understanding of our cultural, social
and political differences and so forge
stronger relationships, not just with the
Middle East but also with rest of the world.

stephanie cotela tanner

Art historian and writer, London

Ramin Haerizadeh,MenofAllah (04,2008).
Courtesy of the Saatchi Gallery,London ^ Ramin
Haerizadeh, 2009.

Rokni Haerizadeh,TypicalIranianWedding (left
panel), (2008).Courtesy of the Saatchi Gallery,
London ^ Rokni Haerizadeh, 2009.

16 The ArtBook volume 16 issue 4 november 2009 r 2009 the authors. journal compilation r 2009 bpl/aah

Perspectives