Igshaan Adams : ‘Have you seen Him?’ (2013)Artist Bio: Born in Cape Town in 1982, Igshaa

Igshaan Adams : ‘Have you seen Him?’ (2013)Artist Bio: Born in Cape Town in 1982, Igshaan Adams is an installation and mixed media artist whose work investigates hybrid identity. Adams was raised in a community racially classified in South Africa as ʻcolouredʼ under apartheid legislature. The term ʻcolouredʼ is still used in South Africa to refer to the creole community whose distant origins are Malay, but whose racial profile is hybrid and unclassifiable. An observant but liberal Muslim raised by Christian grandparents, Adams occupies a precarious place in his religious community because of his homosexuality. His work speaks to his experiences of racial, religious and sexual liminality in South Africa, but breaks with a strong representational convention in recent South African art. Adams uses the material and formal iconographies of Islam and ʻcolouredʼ culture to develop a more equivocal, phenomenological exploration of liminalilty.The title of the exhibition [ 'Have you seen Him?’] references fabled sayings by Mullah Nasiruddin, the 13th century Seljuq satirical Sufi who is often referred to as 'the wise fool’. Adams identifies with the populist philosopher’s often humorous searches for God in domestic and other commonplace objects.The exhibition features installation works and embroideries. The latter represents furniture pieces based on particular objects of personal, family and religious significance. Adams renders the objects incomplete, or with structural weaknesses counter to their quotidian functionality. The array of predominantly textile-based installations allude to disturbances within the comforts of home: explicating what happens when home becomes a place of danger.The personal narrative that runs through the work culminates in 'If that I Knew’, the largest installation in the exhibition. The focal point of this work is a carpet of prayer mats representing a prone dog juxtaposed with the patterns and architectural elements inherent in the design of the carpets. Adams explains: “In Islam the dog is considered an impure animal. Superimposing the image of the dog on the Holy City is an act of claiming a stake despite rejection and ridicule. All the works in this body are conversations: between God and myself, moments and experiences. These conversations are often argumentative, conflictual, yet, intimate and at times reassuring.” - artthrob in southafricapreviously posted here -- source link

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