Samira Abbassy, 'Redemptive Narratives and Migrating Patterns'

About

Artist Statement: 

This selection of works consists of works on paper and oil paintings on gesso panel. They are worked, reworked and occasionally destroyed.

These works take on questions and ideas of how to reveal the figure as a psycho/emotional being, and how to depict "a state of being" rather than making objective portraits of the figure. 

My work can be described as autobiographical, and perhaps even confessional. I make appearances as various avatars evoking archetypes from various traditions; Greek myths, Old Testament stories, Hindu deities and Muslim folklore.

The titles offer clues to their source of intellectual, cultural, mental and emotional dilemmas, with which we all struggle. By excavating the art of cultures that were considered to be outside the “Western Canon” (Indian, Persian, Tibetan, Hindu/ Muslim/ Buddhist etc), I concoct fictional or mythological histories.

The canvas becomes a place of self-examination; “a mirror of inclusion”, a place to contextualize the Self and establish an identity. The central figure appears as an archetype rather than a literal attempt at self-portraiture, as if attempting to depict myself from the inside out, starting with how it feels to be me, or rather, how it feels to be human.’

By fusing together disparate languages, conventions and myths, I’m seeking an iconography of hybridism, where their underlying common threads can be found. My work attempts to transcend cultural boundaries by proving the porous nature of cultural influence through migration, both historically and currently.

Samira Abbassy

January 2017