ROBBREPORT.COM 63
GYRO TABLE: ANGELA MOORE; HAYV KAHRAMAN: COURTESY OF JACK SHAINMAN GALLERYGYRO
TABLE:The Goods | ART & DESIGNBend It Like Kahraman
In Hayv Kahraman’s new paintings of female
contortionists, women’s heads arch backward
to meet their buttocks or thighs; sometimes their
bent bodies are piled one on top of another, like a
toddler’s stacking toy. As intriguing to Kahraman
as their feats, however, are viewers’ reactions to
such flexibility: amazement, yes, but also disgust
at the figures’ unnatural elasticity. “Bodies can
be seen as not human enough,” she says. It’s
a potent metaphor for the plight of the “other,”
whether racial minorities or immigrants.
The paintings, which will be on view in a solo
exhibition at Jack Shainman Gallery (jackshainman
.com) in New York opening September 5, evolved
from a performance piece Kahraman created
last year in LA, her adopted home. Working
with a dozen dancers triggered memories of
her childhood ballet classes in Baghdad, before
she fled Iraq with her family at age 10 in 1992.
Kahraman had the ability to dislocate her shoulder
and hip. “I used this deformity as spectacle,” she
says. “I would show it off and say, ‘Look at me.’ ”
But flaunting physical differences can have the
unintended consequence of turning a person into
a freak show, a feeling Kahraman experienced as
a brown-skinned refugee in Sweden. “The only
way I could survive that context and environmentwas to assimilate—to look at what people want
me to be and be that,” she says. “For me, these
bending bodies—specifically, backwards—that
extreme, almost violent act is reminiscent of
contorting yourself and your identity to the
majority, to the power.”
The female figures that appear throughout
her oeuvre—avatars for the artist—are ghostly
transparent in these latest works, save for their
thick black hair and bright red lips. Kahraman
says she was motivated by her status as an Arab
woman and the peculiar, seemingly oxymoronic
twin sensations of standing out from a crowd
while being certain no one is really seeing her. “I’m
interested in how my skin can become super-
hyper-visible,” she says. “I feel it every time I land
in Sweden—everybody’s looking at me because
of my skin, my hair, but I’m completely invisible in
terms of who I am.”
While the paintings are large—most are at least
five feet tall, some almost nine—Kahraman also
plans to include several small-scale drawings of
the same motif in the show. The series continues
her pursuit of what she calls “archiving memories”
to preserve her sense of self. “It’s very urgent for
me to recover my biography,” she says, “which I
feel is being erased.” Julie Belcoveview against the historic, palatial backdrop
of Venice’s Ca’ d’Oro through November
24 (carpentersworkshopgallery.com).
As climate change approaches the
point of irreversibility, designers are
addressing the elephant in the room
(before it, too, goes extinct) by creating
works as cautionary tales. Some of
Dysfunctional’s 50 pieces speak to global
warming, while others encourage the
viewer to rethink throwaway culture
(a particular design problem in the
Ikea era). Studio Drift’s Fragile Future
chandelier, for instance, is composed of
bronze electrical circuits and hundreds of
handpicked dandelion seeds glued to LED
cores, bringing to light a labor-intensive
construction process, as well as man’s
modern-day synergy with nature. Spanish
designer Nacho Carbonell’s tree-like
chandeliers evoke a similar dichotomy,
with limbs and branches composed of
weighty mesh.
But Dysfunctional is no design-
show stunt—it’s an outgrowth of a new
movement fueled by eco-centric messages
(that you can also happen to put in your
living room). Ocean waste has long been
an inspiration for Brodie Neill, whose
Gyro Table (shown below) arranges blue
and green microplastic chips—found
on beaches—in a circle to loosely mimic
Earth’s longitudinal and latitudinal
lines. The designer’s Capsule hourglass,
meanwhile, forgoes sand for plastic, also
recovered from ailing oceans—a reference,
Neill says, to the fact that we are running
out of time to save the planet. Huy Bui
takes a similar approach, probing our
relationship to nature. His Geological
Frame objects showcase recycled wood
that melts across a brass frame—a study in
how humans (and Bui himself ) are shaping
the Earth. It’s deeper thinking than you’d
expect would go into your unassuming
lounge chair or elegant credenza. And
it might just be the catalyst for a bigger
conversation—depending on where you’re
sitting, of course. Helena MaddenNot Quite Human 2 (2019), by Hayv Kahraman.ROBBREPORT.COM 63
ANGELA MOORE; HAYV KAHRAMAN: COURTESY OF JACK SHAINMAN GALLERY
G YR
O
TABLE:
The Goods | ART & DESIGNBend It Like Kahraman
In Hayv Kahraman’s new paintings of female
contortionists, women’s heads arch backward
to meet their buttocks or thighs; sometimes their
bent bodies are piled one on top of another, like a
toddler’s stacking toy. As intriguing to Kahraman
as their feats, however, are viewers’ reactions to
such flexibility: amazement, yes, but also disgust
at the figures’ unnatural elasticity. “Bodies can
be seen as not human enough,” she says. It’s
a potent metaphor for the plight of the “other,”
whether racial minorities or immigrants.
The paintings, which will be on view in a solo
exhibition at Jack Shainman Gallery (jackshainman
.com) in New York opening September 5, evolved
from a performance piece Kahraman created
last year in LA, her adopted home. Working
with a dozen dancers triggered memories of
her childhood ballet classes in Baghdad, before
she fled Iraq with her family at age 10 in 1992.
Kahraman had the ability to dislocate her shoulder
and hip. “I used this deformity as spectacle,” she
says. “I would show it off and say, ‘Look at me.’ ”
But flaunting physical differences can have the
unintended consequence of turning a person into
a freak show, a feeling Kahraman experienced as
a brown-skinned refugee in Sweden. “The only
way I could survive that context and environmentwas to assimilate—to look at what people want
me to be and be that,” she says. “For me, these
bending bodies—specifically, backwards—that
extreme, almost violent act is reminiscent of
contorting yourself and your identity to the
majority, to the power.”
The female figures that appear throughout
her oeuvre—avatars for the artist—are ghostly
transparent in these latest works, save for their
thick black hair and bright red lips. Kahraman
says she was motivated by her status as an Arab
woman and the peculiar, seemingly oxymoronic
twin sensations of standing out from a crowd
while being certain no one is really seeing her. “I’m
interested in how my skin can become super-
hyper-visible,” she says. “I feel it every time I land
in Sweden—everybody’s looking at me because
of my skin, my hair, but I’m completely invisible in
terms of who I am.”
While the paintings are large—most are at least
five feet tall, some almost nine—Kahraman also
plans to include several small-scale drawings of
the same motif in the show. The series continues
her pursuit of what she calls “archiving memories”
to preserve her sense of self. “It’s very urgent for
me to recover my biography,” she says, “which I
feel is being erased.” Julie Belcoveview against the historic, palatial backdrop
of Venice’s Ca’ d’Oro through November
24 (carpentersworkshopgallery.com).
As climate change approaches the
point of irreversibility, designers are
addressing the elephant in the room
(before it, too, goes extinct) by creating
works as cautionary tales. Some of
Dysfunctional’s 50 pieces speak to global
warming, while others encourage the
viewer to rethink throwaway culture
(a particular design problem in the
Ikea era). Studio Drift’s Fragile Future
chandelier, for instance, is composed of
bronze electrical circuits and hundreds of
handpicked dandelion seeds glued to LED
cores, bringing to light a labor-intensive
construction process, as well as man’s
modern-day synergy with nature. Spanish
designer Nacho Carbonell’s tree-like
chandeliers evoke a similar dichotomy,
with limbs and branches composed of
weighty mesh.
But Dysfunctional is no design-
show stunt—it’s an outgrowth of a new
movement fueled by eco-centric messages
(that you can also happen to put in your
living room). Ocean waste has long been
an inspiration for Brodie Neill, whose
Gyro Table (shown below) arranges blue
and green microplastic chips—found
on beaches—in a circle to loosely mimic
Earth’s longitudinal and latitudinal
lines. The designer’s Capsule hourglass,
meanwhile, forgoes sand for plastic, also
recovered from ailing oceans—a reference,
Neill says, to the fact that we are running
out of time to save the planet. Huy Bui
takes a similar approach, probing our
relationship to nature. His Geological
Frame objects showcase recycled wood
that melts across a brass frame—a study in
how humans (and Bui himself ) are shaping
the Earth. It’s deeper thinking than you’d
expect would go into your unassuming
lounge chair or elegant credenza. And
it might just be the catalyst for a bigger
conversation—depending on where you’re
sitting, of course. Helena MaddenNot Quite Human 2 (2019), by Hayv Kahraman.