Jaishri Abichandani
Bio
Born in Bombay, India, Jaishri Abichandani immigrated to New York City in 1984. She received her Master of Visual Arts Degree from Goldsmiths College, University of London and has continued to intertwine art and activism in her career, founding the South Asian Women’s Creative Collective in New York and London. She has exhibited her work internationally at various venues including P.S.1/MOMA, the Queens Museum of Art, and Exit Art in New York; the 798 Beijing Biennial and the Guangzhou Triennial in China; Nature Morte and Gallery Chemould in India; the IVAM in Valencia; and the House of World Cultures in Berlin. Jaishri served as the founding Director of Public Events and Projects from 2003–06 at the Queens Museum of Art, where she co-curated Fatal Love: South Asian American Art Now and Queens International 2006 Everything All at Once. Other international curatorial projects include Sultana’s Dream, Exploding the Lotus, Artists in Exile, Anomalies, and Transitional Aesthetics. Her work is included in various international collections including the Burger Collection (burgercollection.com), the Florian Peters-Messer Collection (www.fpmcollection.com), and the Saatchi Collection.
Artist Statement
Abichandani produces material and ephemeral works that examine, subvert, and generate power by exploring the relationships between individual and collective selves and their effect on society. Her dual practices of art and cultural production manifest as installations, objects, videos, and performances. Primarily a political artist, her work integrates multiple aesthetics reflecting her identities as a feminist South Asian American artist to examine the implications of personal, political, and spiritual choices, creating psychologically charged works with a strong narrative element. Abichandani creates a cultural context for her work by activating democratic feminist networks (www.sawcc.org) and curating exhibitions.
Work Detail:
Allah hu Akhbar
Edition 2 of 3
Leather, whips, wire, nails, paint, Swarovski crystals
Dimensions variable
2008