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Walter and McBean Galleries, SFAI

April 22 - June 26, 2011

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800 Chestnut Street San Francisco, CA 94133
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The exploding company man and other abstractions Prolonged Exposure to Agitation. Ink and gouache on prepared paper, 2009. Courtesy of the artist and Sikkema Jenkins & Co, New York
Opening reception with live musical performance: Friday, April 22 from 5:30-7:30 pm. The San Francisco Art Institute is pleased to announce "Shahzia Sikander: The exploding company man and other abstractions," an exhibition of paintings, drawings, and animations by Pakistan-born artist Shahzia Sikander. The show is on view April 23–June 25, 2011 in SFAI’s Walter and McBean Galleries. Now based in New York, Sikander studied miniature painting in the late 1980s at the National College of Art in Lahore, Pakistan. Since then, she has developed an original artistic practice that creates a new dialogue with this traditional painting style. By referring to the traditional forms of Indo-Persian miniatures, she conjures associations with imperialism, as well as storytelling and popular mythology. Yet by unraveling the conventions of miniaturist paintings, she also deconstructs the post-colonial legacy of the Indo-Persian region. Her work confronts and interrogates the perceptual distances between the cultures designated as ‘East’ and ‘West,’ an area of poignancy and difficulty in the current political climate. "Shahzia Sikander: The exploding company man and other abstractions," curated by Hou Hanru, features work created during the last five years, along with the U.S. premierea of an animated video and live performance. This animation, "The Last Post," is inspired by Sikander’s ongoing interest in the colonial history of the sub-continent and the British opium trade with China. The protagonist is an East India Company man—the “exploding” man of the show’s title. At the opening reception, Du Yun, a New York-based musician originally from Shanghai, and Wally Scharold, a composer and guitarist from Oakland, will perform "Gossamer," a piece conceived as a dramatic soundscape to accompany "The Last Post." This show at the Walter and McBean Galleries is part of the Global Figures component of SFAI’s Exhibitions and Public Programs, designed to bring some of the most remarkable actors in the current global art scene to West Coast audiences. Other recent works by Sikander on display include the drawings "Confrontation," "Prolonged Exposure to Agitation," and "Series of Transformations"; the animated drawings "Pursuit Curve" and "SpiNN"; and the video "Bending the Barrels".
The exploding company man and other abstractions The Last Post. Animated drawing, 2010. Courtesy of the artist and Sikkema Jenkins & Co, New York