B21
is proud to welcome back Egyptian painter Hani Rashed for
his first solo show in Subai. A life-long resident of Cairo,
33 year old Hani Rashed trained at fellow Egyptian artist
Mohamed Abla’s atelier
for a decade before venturing off on his own creative path
in 2004.
Rashed has devoted himself to his art since then and recently
quit his day job as a soundman for Egyptian Television, which
helps to explain his particular style. The drawings and their
distribution are illustrated in an almost televised manner; the
often comical characters are pointedly cinematic. Two times awarded
first prize for painting and drawing at the Salon of Youth in
Cairo, he was also selected for the biennales of Dakar, Senegal
and Cape Town, South Africa. Rashed has had several solo exhibitions
in Cairo at the Mashrabia Gallery. His work has also been shown
internationally, most recently at the Frieze Art Fair in London
as well as in Greece, France and Spain. Rashed’s audience
extends beyond the art world and he has lately become the illustrator
for book covers.
Known for his collages and work on wood panels, he uses an
artificial palette of colors in typically naïve drawings.
At first glance the art of Hani Rashed seems as if it could
be an illustration from some bizarre retro comic strip. His
innocent-looking style captures a disoriented contemporary
universe, a place where faceless human figures repeat the movements
of the everyday. They are flanked by magazine clippings or
engaged in some sort of meaningless action. Rashed brings an Egyptian sensibility
to the traditionally American domain of pop culture. His
works offer keen yet candid observations of the social issues
that confront modern Egyptians. They resonate in a society
where violent mass media inevitably plays a role. The monotony
of his young urban characters, underscored by the multitude
of missing faces, draws attention to the malign influence
of a ‘one size fits all’ cultural paradigm.
The turbulent and foreboding landscape in which they are set
is further remonstrance of a young Egyptian society disconnected
from traditional life.
His mixed-media works juxtapose magazine cut-outs and painted
planes, recording the everyday cross-cultural interactions
of urban youth. The long wooden panels and roughly cut cardboard
shapes that Rashed utilizes bring the viewer into direct contact
with this reality.
Rashed’s single-window studio
offers a glimpse inside the mind of the artist; every surface
is piled high with yellowing magazines and a patchwork of
painterly detritus, the walls are a decoupage of disfigured
advertising images, faces, words and symbols.
Rashed plays with the idea that the
ubiquity of Western media has made Middle Easterners hyper-tuned
to what’s happening
in the West. Rashed has chosen to represent individuals he
calls “simple people, with whom I could engage in a way
others don’t. They are people that attracted me, people
I felt close to.” Amiss but lively, the multitude of
cloned figures reflects the rhythm of urban life in one of
the world’s largest cities. Rashed’s youth informs
his conceptual approach but his art, rooted in an urban aesthetic,
transcends age and identity.
|
