Amirhossein Bayani: Out of Context. Exhibition opening reception July 6, 2018 at Ars Libri, Boston

Opening reception for the new exhibit

Amirhossein Bayani: Out of Context

Friday, July 6, 2018 from 5:30 to 7:30 pm

at Ars Libri, 500 Harrison Avenue, Boston, MA 02118

Amirhossein Bayani- Out of Context July 6 2018 Ars Libri

Out of Context
“With an utterly critical approach, the series deals with politics of power, considering how it empties the subjects of their essence, and how it manipulates reality. After studying various elements in Persian miniatures, which generally depend on different contexts, I have taken these blown-up figures out of their contexts, filling them up with new aesthetics and with what formerly existed outside of them. Lost and bewildered, they live in white contexts on the walls, which they don’t belong. The series aims at capturing the essence of art in a paradoxical fashion, keeping possibilities for emancipation in perspective.” From https://curiator.com/art/amirhossein-bayani/out-of-context-12

OUT OF CONTEXT
As described by the artist, AMIRHOSSEIN BAYANI

“The series deals with politics. Not politics of emancipation, but power politics. With an utterly critical approach, it is trying to confront the part of politics that is zeroing in on the entirety of human existence and is trying hard to annihilate it. It is as if we are facing the mere fact which directs all the ways towards economic globalization and art globalization. It goes without saying to considering this issue exhaustively in a single series is impossible. Thus, it is focusing on how the subject is colonized by the politics of power. It talks about the part in which the politics of power acts subtly with violence and with a fashionable appearance! , emptying the subjects of their substance, changing identities, perpetually attacking the organic unity of subjects, taking care of everything, repeatedly manipulating the reality, advertising it, and finally making them authentic so much so that any critical approach would be immediately accused of being reactionary and recessive: an intricate mechanism that owes its very existence to creating crisis.

Persian forms are pictures in tiny scales, with disorderly compositions, that generally make a unique, unified experience for the viewer. Commonly, they narrate a story that exists outside of them: they depend on a different context. They are very gentle and poetic, even when they narrate the most violent scenes; according to their different eras, they have their particular stylistic characteristics. The elements are generally idealized, they emphasize details, and they have their own perspective. We can go on talking and doing research about Persian images for years.

In this series, I have considered all the elements of Persian images, except their nature. In the first stage of using violence, I have cut out a piece out of them and have taken them out of their context. Then I have blown them up, much larger than their original size, which is to say I have aggrandized them, it is as if we are seeing microscopic images! It is as if they are being zoomed in. It is as if they are control samples. In the next stage, I realized that the aesthetic inside them is not enough, so I decided to bring in a new kind of aesthetic. I poured their surrounding nature, which was working properly as context for the figures’ initial conditions, into them and I even gave them ideas! I even changed the material of technical approach and led the technical part to a direction that I wanted.

What we eventually see is only reminiscent of Persian painting, and they are even more seductive and apparently self-contained. But they are in fact new subjects emptied of their essence. Lost and bewildered, they live in white contexts on the walls to which they do not belong.

This show is aimed at capturing the essence of art in a paradoxical manner in order to establish a dialogue between the aesthetics of art and potential emancipation latent in politics and to admit standing within the circle of power while keeping possibilities for emancipation in perspective.”
–Amirhossein Bayani (From http://mohsen.gallery/artists/series/2016/out-of-context-2/)

About the Artist:

Amirhossein Bayani
Born in 1977
Artist, Curator, and University Professor

Education
2004 M.A. in Art Research, Art & Architecture Faculty of Azad Art University
2000 B.A. in Painting, University of Art, Tehran
Visual Art Diploma, IRIB Art School

Some Activities
2011 Founder and Art Director at MERXOUT Projects
2013 Member of Artraker winners
Member of Iranian Painters Society
Member of Institute for Promotion of Visual Arts
Member of electorate committee of Radio & Television College
Founder of Tehran Art Group

Curating Experiences
2014 Salvation Gaza, Niavaran Complex, Tehran, Iran
2013 MERXOUT Projects, Open Source, Shirin Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2012 MERXOUT Projects, OCCUPY ME! (Dedicated to RADIOHEAD), Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2011 Pool, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2010 In Honour of 68, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran

Solo Exhibitions
2016 “Out of Context”, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2013 Babylon System, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2010 What was happened to the women in shahnameh? , Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2009 Brides of Our Time, Etemad Art Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2006 Eyes’ wide shot, Azad art gallery, Tehran, Iran

International Group Exhibitions
2017 “Shadow of Garden”, Stiftelsen 3,14 Gallery , Bergen, Norway
2013 Artraker, Babylon System (top 3 selected by Jury), London, UK
2013 Babylon System (Video), Goldsmiths University, London, UK
2013 Facade Video Festival, Message from Iran (top 10 selected by the jury), Plovdiv, Bulgaria
2013 Down street Art, Massachusetts, the USA
2013 SOMART, Speak Your Peace
2012 The 5th Beijing International Art Biennale, National Art Museum of China, Beijing, China
2011 Contemporary Istanbul, International Art Fai, Istanbul, Turkey
2011 BERLINER LISTE, International Art Fair, Berlin, Germany
2010 The 4th Beijing International Art Biennale, National Art Museum of China, Beijing, China
2008 Group painting exhibition, Heaven on Earth Now, The Brick Lane Gallery, London, UK
2007 CAREVAN, Shiraz art gallery, Venice, Italy
2007 Group painting exhibition with Iranian contemporary artists, Dar-All-Fonoon art gallery, Kuwait
2007 Painting exhibition with Iranian contemporary artists, Assar Art Gallery

Group Exhibitions
2017 “Postcards”, Azad Art Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2017 “Trends and Approaches in Contemporary Iranian Art”, Pardis Mellat Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2016 Shahnameh, the Perpetual Narrative, Curator: Akram Tavana , Arran Art Gallery
2014 Zoo, Shirin Art Gallery
2014 A Review of decade of Video Art in Iran, Iranian Artists Forum
2013 “History Game”, Etemad Gallery
2013 Group Exhibition Titled: Shahnameh FerdowsiI, Curator: Reza Hedayat Laleh Art Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2012 Mesociety Tehran Workshop, a Hydro city Project
2011 13X18 PORTRAIT, Etemad Art Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2010 Performance Box Curatorship, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2010 “To Paint Cinema”, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2010 Obligatory Military Service, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2010 Second Memorial of Professor Freidoon Mam Beigi, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2010 Drawing exhibition with Iranian contemporary artists, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran, Iran
2008 First Memorial of Professor Freidoon Mam Beigi, Azad Art Gallery, Tehran, Iran

Art Fair
2014 ART14 LONDON, International Art Fair, London, UK
2011 BERLINER LISTE International Art Fair, Berlin, Germany
2011 Contemporary Istanbul International Art Fair, Istanbul, Turkey