Titled ‘In Medias Res’ (literally at once), the exhibition includes nine paintings in which the viewer experiences imagination, transformation, and violence illustrated in sublime levels, Financial Tribune reports.
As Banisadr explains, “’In Medias Res’ is a metaphor for the way my paintings are made, the way the story begins with an explosion, in the middle of action and then it slowly unfolds and unveils its content.”
In motion and evolving throughout the process of creation, Banisadr’s work is characterized by an instability that fascinates the viewer and showcases the very essence of imagination. Neither completely abstract nor figurative, the scenes that he paints fit within the art history narrative, from Hieronymous Bosch to Francis Bacon, bearing this ability to transport the viewer into realms where beauty borders on horror, order on disorder, and where the depths of the sea merge with the farthest reaches of outer space.
The origin of chaos is perhaps what ultimately enables us to see the artist, like an imperfect symphony, the one who orchestrates forms and colors, slow and intense movements, to reach a disconcerting harmony that freezes within time, the creative explosion that unfurls under the viewer’s gaze.
Nonetheless, alongside his explosion and in contrast to his previous works, the artist integrates lines that bring structure to his pieces. For the artist, these lines are the very representation of language, words and their structure, which conflict with the language of painting.
Accompanied by charcoal drawings, the paintings dialogue with these sketches and particularize the abstract characters that populate the paintings, thus enhancing and completing his core work.
Born in Tehran in 1976, Ali Banisadr lives and works in New York.
His works are part of the collections of numerous institutions, such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the British Museum in London, and the Francois Pinault Foundation in Venice.
A catalogue is published to accompany the exhibition featuring an essay by Philippe Dagen, an art critic and professor at the Sorbonne.
The exhibition will continue through January 16.
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