Everywhere and Nowhere
Gaby Sahhar
13th April 2024 - 26th May 2024
Everywhere and Nowhere is a presentation of new works by Gaby Sahhar including painting, sculpture and a sound work.
The works in the show become a third space for reimagining Palestine in a post-border environment connected to the wider world. Fragments of concrete and metal processing structures are collapsed and layered into different mediterranean-arab natural rock formations. Imagined as disused and abandoned, the architecture in the works are taken from multiple international border crossings between Palestine and neighbouring middle eastern countries. The paintings become an abstract but articulate language that is repeated and strengthened throughout the series.
The feeling of a transitional space, hybridity and political awakening become amplified through the use of figuration; reminiscent of William Blake's visual world, particularly the illustration “Glad Day” (c.1795). In Glad Day Blake’s neurodivergent vision of humanity becomes united in one body; a collective vision that challenges both the order of society and the minds that uphold it.
Sahhar’s interest in absolute liberation is continued in a series of sculptures and sound pieces produced in collaboration with Owen Pratt alongside Severin Black. Playing softly in the corner of the gallery, Pratt has expanded and responded to the paintings in the show, Ideas of censorship, hypertension and border space are infused with subtle but distorted vocals.
Boxes of Palestinian Medjoul dates purchased in London have been altered, painted and pinned to become unrecognisable. The date; a fruit of historical, religious and social importance acts as a direct link to land and is one of the most widely exported products from Palestine. Their packaging remains as the boxes take on new forms of political and philosophical meaning that are simultaneously unifying, fragmented and dazzled.
Gaby Sahhar is a French-Palestinian artist working between London and Paris; their rejection of binaries is reflected in a multi-disciplinary practice that spans painting, video and installation. It is an ongoing concern of Sahhar to deconstruct representations of queerness within the public sphere, considering the impact of this representation on queer consciousness and communities. Sahhar aims to generate dialogue around migration, value systems and affordability within city cultures. Through speculative storytelling their work illustrates the various ways psychological and physical frameworks fragment Palestinian geopolitical borders and identity.
Gaby Sahhar; Whitechapel Gallery, London, 2023, MAC VAL, Paris, 2023; PAGE (NYC), New York, 2022; Sadie Coles HQ, London, 2022, SPACE Awards, 2021. BFI London Film festival, 2019, Forthcoming exhibitions include Arab World Institute, Paris, Magasins Généraux, Paris Spiaggia Libera Gallery, Paris
