TEHRAN-A group exhibition at October Gallery in London titled “Transvangarde: Free Style Cipher” is underway, in which Iranian painter Golnaz Fathi’s works are also included.

The exhibition also showcases new works by Sokari Douglas Camp CBE, Alexis Peskine and Govinda Sah Azad, as well as selected works by Susanne Kessler, Tian Wei, Jukhee Kwon, Elisabeth Lalouschek, and Romuald Hazoumè, amongst others, Gallery Info reported.

Based on the hip-hop notion of an interactive, freewheeling exchange of contrasting ideas and styles, the exhibited works will focus on the visual language particular to each artist, helping to decode the various layers of meaning and shed revealing light on each artist’s individual practice in conversation with and in relation to their peers.

Fathi, 52, is a contemporary artist, recognized for her reinterpretations of traditional Persian calligraphy. While most known for her pen- or acrylic-on-canvas works characterized by intricate lines and gestural brush strokes, she also engages with other media, including LED light and video installations. She is noted for her artwork in the hurufiyya tradition.

The hurufiyya movement is an aesthetic movement that emerged in the second half of the 20th century amongst Muslim artists, who used their understanding of traditional Islamic calligraphy within the precepts of modern art. By combining tradition and modernity, these artists worked towards developing a culture specific visual language, which instilled a sense of national identity in their respective nation states, at a time when many of these states were shaking off colonial rule and asserting their independence. They adopted the same name as the Hurufi, an approach of Sufism which emerged in the late 14th–early 15th century.

While studying Graphic Design at Azad University in Tehran, Fathi, always fascinated by the expressive potential of traditional Persian calligraphic forms, immersed herself in a sustained six-year study of traditional calligraphy. She then became one of only a tiny handful of women trained to the highest level within that discipline. Despite this Fathi felt the need to expand her practice and developed an idiom of her own with large, bold abstractions. In 2003, she travelled to France and spent three months at the Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris, on a scholarship.

Her hand movements form uncompromised gestures, emerging out of the deep layers and attempt to capture a thought, emotion, or sound. Undertaken with the same consideration, each work is densely inscribed with potential meanings allowing unrestrained imaginative possibilities.

Fathi’s work is inspired by Iranian cultural heritage, most notably architecture and the traditional art of calligraphy. Her canvases often combine bold areas of primary colors (particularly red, a color that the artist associates with energy) and black (representing completeness). Fathi’s considerable technical expertise in the art of beautiful writing means that she can experiment and play with the possibilities of calligraphy. This is exemplified by her technique of ‘invisible writing’, which sees Persian script rendered in an abstracted, almost incomplete hand.

Her first solo exhibition at October Gallery, “Liminal-Subliminal,” took place in 2010, followed by a second solo show “Dance Me to the End of Night” in 2014. Her work can be found in collections around the world, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA; Carnegie Mellon University in Doha, Qatar; Islamic Art Museum, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; the British Museum, London, UK; Denver Art Museum, Denver, USA; Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton & Hove, UK; Asian Civilization’s Museum, Singapore; and Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi, India.

Having launched on January 18, the exhibition “Transvangarde: Free Style Cipher” will run until March 2 at October Gallery.

SS/SAB