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The National Pavilion of the United Arab Emirates announces Mohammed
Kazem as featured artist and Reem Fadda as curator for the 55th
International Art Exhibition–La Biennale di Venezia.
Mohammed Kazem is a leading conceptual artist in the UAE contemporary art
scene and is known for his incorporation of new media and his sophisticated
formalist language. His interest in conceptual art and progressive attitude
towards form and context is especially highlighted by his ongoing series
"Directions." Kazem first studied Fine Arts at the Emirates Fine Art
Society and subsequently studied music at the Al Rayat Music Institute of
Dubai and painting at the Edinburgh College of Art. He was a Painting
Instructor at the Dubai Art Atelier for ten years. Widely known through
numerous solo and group exhibitions in the UAE and abroad, Kazem's
participation includes the Havana Biennial (2000), Singapore Biennale
(2006), Dhaka Biennial–Bangladesh (2002), and the Sharjah Biennale
(1993–2007). Most recently he exhibited at the University of the
Arts, Philadelphia (2010); and at the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2012). His
works have been collected by private collectors and institutions such as
Deutsche Bank as well as museums in Doha, Sharjah, JP Morgan Chase Bank
(USA), and Sittard (Holland).
From her curatorial concept, Fadda
stated; "Mohammed Kazem, a pioneering contemporary artist and thinker from
the UAE, represents a generation that emerged from an avant-garde legacy of
arts and artists in the UAE and the surrounding region, one that has
thrived since the mid-'70s with advocates such as his mentor artist Hassan
Sharif. The curatorial research for our pavilions presentation in Venice
will see Kazem as the key individual artist and thinker he is and highlight
his contribution to the local artistic heritage."
"By engaging
the work of Kazem, we can witness the urban modernity of an emerging nation
through the eyes of its individual artists. In pursuing this initiative we
hope to demonstrate that the developments we see in the region today do not
come from a void, but rather evolve from the contemporary thought and
practice of artists and intellectuals like Kazem, whose work has
consistently interrogated the relationship between the individual and
his/her social, urban, and natural environments. In this sense, it
manifests as a living artistic synthesis of a critical debate over the
modernity and the global reality of the citizen and nation-state,"
elaborated Fadda.
Reem Fadda is currently working as Associate
Curator of Middle Eastern Art–Guggenheim Abu Dhabi Project at the
Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation. She is also a PhD candidate at the
History of Art and Visual Studies Department at Cornell University.
Previously, Fadda was Director of the Palestinian Association for
Contemporary Art (PACA) and worked as Academic Director at the
International Academy of Art – Palestine, which she helped found in
2006. She curated many projects such as Liminal Spaces
featured at PACA, Digital Art lab Holon and Galerie
Leipzig; Ramallah Syndrome with Decolonizing Architecture at
the 53rd Venice Biennale, Tarjama/Translation at the Queens Museum
& Herbert E. Johnson Museum in New York and the 3rd RIWAQ
Biennale, which she co-curated with Charles Esche in Ramallah.
The National Pavilion of the United Arab Emirates is initiated and
supported by His Excellency Abdul Rahman bin Mohammed Al Owais, UAE
Minister of Culture, Youth and Community Development. The National Pavilion
of the UAE continues to be developed and presented under the leadership of
its Commissioner, Dr. Lamees Hamdan, a leader in the art and culture scene
in the UAE and member of the Board of Directors of the Dubai Culture and
Arts Authority.
The Sheikha Salama bint Hamdan Al Nahyan
Foundation is generously supporting the Pavilion for the first time. The
Foundation works to contribute to the creation of positive futures for the
citizens of the United Arab Emirates and the full realization of their
potential and aspirations. It develops and supports charitable initiatives
in the areas of education, arts, culture and heritage, and the
environment.
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