Ahmed Alsoudani
By: Ahmed Alsoudani ; essay, Suzannah Biernoff
Contributors: Biernoff, Suzannah; Haunch of Venison (Gallery)
Publisher: Haunch of Venison
Published: 2011
Place of publication: London
Language: eng
ISBN-13: 9781905620593
Subjects: Modern Painting; Exhibitions; Iraqi Painting
Work titles: Paintings
Description: This catalogue features works from the first solo show in Britain by acclaimed Iraqi-born artist Ahmed Alsoudani. In this new series of paintings, Alsoudani continues his complex exploration of war and conflict, its physical atrocities and psychological consequences. Featuring deformed, almost bestial, figures twisting in vivid and surreal landscapes, these tableaux are often laced with a barbed or morbid humour in the manner of artists such as Francisco Goya and Max Beckmann among others. Imagery of devastation and violence abounds, with figures depicted at the moment of a dramatic transition - through fear or agony - from the human to the grotesque. While Alsoudani acknowledges the influence of many artists on his work - from Caravaggio to Carroll Dunham - he has at the same time developed his own unique pictorial language,based on his personal experiences of growing up under Saddam Hussein's regime during the first Gulf War and of the more recent Iraq conflict.
Notes: Catalog of an exhibition held at Haunch of Venison, London, Oct. 14--Nov. 28, 2011.