Shiva Ahmadi

Shiva Ahmadi (born 1975) is an Iranian-American artist known for her paintings, videos and installations, which have been exhibited at galleries and museums in North America and the Middle East.

Shiva Ahmadi
Born1975 (age 44–45)
Tehran, Iran
Alma mater
  • Cranbrook Academy of Arts, MFA
  • Azad University, BFA
Known forDrawing, painting, animation

Biography

Ahmadi was born in Tehran, Iran in 1975.[1][2] Her upbringing, which is reflected in her art, was marked by the Iranian Revolution and the Iran–Iraq War.[3] She obtained a bachelor of fine art from Azad University in 1998 and right after moved to USA to pursue her graduate studies. She attended Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan and received an Master of Art Degree in Drawing (2000) and a Master of Fine Arts in Drawing (2003). [4][5][2] In 2003 she attended an artist residency at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture.[6] In 2005 Ahmadi obtained her second MFA, in painting from Cranbrook Academy of Art.[5] Ahmadi was appointed as an Associate Professor of Art at the University of California, Davis in 2015.[7][2]

Career

Ahmadi's practice borrows from the artistic traditions of Iran and the Middle East to critically examine contemporary political tensions. Incorporating cultural symbols Ahmadi has taken a critical look at current social and political issues.[8]

Ahmadi works across a variety of media, including watercolor painting, sculpture, and video animation; consistent through her pieces are the ornate patterns and vibrant colors drawn from Persian, Indian and Middle Eastern art. In her carefully illustrated worlds, formal beauty complicates global legacies of violence and oppression. These playful fantasy realms are upon closer inspection macabre theaters of politics and war: watercolor paint bloodies the canvas, and sinister global machinations play out in abstracted landscapes populated by faceless figures and dominated by oil refineries and labyrinthine pipelines. Known for her achievements in painting, her later career has been marked by the use of video-animation.[2][4] Her first animation Lotus was exhibited extensively in US and around the world and gained recognition from many critics and curators. Her latest animation titled Ascend (2017) was inspired by the death of Aylan Kurdi and Syrian refugee crisis in 2015. It was acquired by the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. [9][10]

Ahmadi's work is included in the collections of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the Asia Society Museum, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the DePaul Art Museum, the Morgan Library & Museum, the Herbert F. Johnson Museum[11], the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, the TDIC Corporate Collection in the United Arab Emirates, and the Farjam Collection in Dubai.[7][4] Her piece Pipes, a five-feet wide watercolor[12], was acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2014.[13]

In 2016 she was awarded the Anonymous Was A Woman award. In 2018 Ahmadi was awarded a fellowship at the Civitella Ranieri Art Residency in Umbria, Italy.

Exhibitions
  • 2018– Burning Song, Haines Gallery, San Francisco
  • 2018– This Land Is Whose Land?, Sun Valley Center For the Arts, Idaho
  • 2018– Catastrophe and the Power of Art, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
  • 2017– Ascend, Leila Heller Gallery, New York, NY[10]
  • 2017 – Rebel, Jester, Mystic, Poet: Contemporary Persians – Aga Khan Museum, Toronto, Ontario[14][15]
  • 2016 – Global/Local 1960–2015: Six Artists from Iran – Grey Art Gallery, New York, City[16][17]
  • 2016 – Homeland Security, For-Site Foundation, San Francisco[18]
  • 2016 – Spheres of Suspension, Charles B. Wang Center, New York, NY[19]
  • 2014 – Shiva Ahmadi: In Focus – Asia Society, New York City[13][1]
  • 2014 – Artist in Exile: Creativity, Activism, and the Diasporic Experience, Geoffrey Yeh Art Gallery, New York, NY
  • 2013 – Apocalyptic Playland – Leila Heller Gallery, New York City
  • 2012 – The Fertile Crescent, Rutgers University Museum Exhibition, Newark, NJ
  • 2011 – Art X Detroit, Museum of Contemporary Art, Detroit, MI
  • 2010 – Shiva Ahmadi: Reinventing the Poetics of Myth – Leila Heller Gallery, New York City[8]
  • 2008-- Ahmadi and Zhang: Looking Back, Feldman Gallery, Pacific Northwest College of Art, Portland, OR.[20]
  • 2005 -- Oil Crisis, Leila Heller Gallery, New York, NY[20]

Awards
gollark: Idea: Macron -6.
gollark: Idea: Macron 4.
gollark: They cannot, in fact, be wrong.
gollark: Our truth cuboids say they're right.
gollark: Our ethics cuboids say it's okay.

References
  1. "Shiva Ahmadi: In Focus". Asia Society. 2014. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  2. Sheets, Hilarie M. (8 February 2016). "Shiva Ahmadi's Subversive Beauty". Introspective Magazine. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  3. Mallonee, Laura C. (14 July 2014). "Using Beauty to Examine Ugly Political Truths". Hyperallergic. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  4. "Shiva Ahmadi". www.leilahellergallery.com. Leila Heller Gallery. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  5. "Shiva Ahmadi". Kresge Arts in Detroit. Kresge Arts in Detroit. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  6. "Shiva Ahmadi: Solo Exhibition at Asia Society Museum, NYC". stamps.umich.edu. Stamps School of Art & Design. Retrieved 20 July 2017.
  7. "Shiva Ahmadi". arts.ucdavis.edu. UC Davis Arts. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  8. Villarreal, Ignacio (2010). "New Paintings and Oil Barrels by Shiva Ahmadi at Leila Taghinia-Milani Heller". artdaily.com. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  9. "Shiva Ahmadi Combines The Beautiful and the Violent". Harper's BAZAAR Arabia. 17 April 2017. Retrieved 20 July 2017.
  10. "Shiva Ahmadi: Ascend – Exhibitions – Leila Heller Gallery". www.leilahellergallery.com. Leila Heller Gallery. Retrieved 20 July 2017.
  11. "Biography - Shiva Ahmadi". www.shivaahmadistudio.com. Retrieved 8 March 2019.
  12. "A Closer Look: Shiva Ahmadi's Pipes". www.metmuseum.org. Retrieved 8 March 2019.
  13. Rooney, Julia. "A Closer Look: Shiva Ahmadi's Pipes". The Metropolitan Museum of Art, i.e. The Met Museum. The Met. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  14. "Rebel, Jester, Mystic, Poet: Contemporary Persians". Aga Khan Museum. 1 November 2016. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  15. Gairola, Vibhu (10 February 2017). "A look at the splendid, politically charged pieces at the Aga Khan Museum's massive new Iranian art exhibition". Toronto Life. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  16. "Global/Local 1960–2015: Six Artists from Iran – Grey Gallery". Grey Gallery. 2016. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  17. Cotter, Holland (14 January 2016). "Six Artists From Iran at Grey Art Gallery". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 August 2017.
  18. "Home Land Security". www.for-site.org. FOR-SITE Foundation. Retrieved 20 July 2017.
  19. "Past Exhibitions". www.stonybrook.edu. Charles B. Wang Centre. Retrieved 20 July 2017.
  20. K., Brodsky, Judith (2012). The fertile crescent : gender, art, and society. Olin, Ferris., Mason Gross School of the Arts (Rutgers University). Galleries. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Institute for Women and Art. ISBN 9780979049798. OCLC 794365492.
  21. "2016 Award Winners". Anonymous Was A Woman Award. Archived from the original on 6 March 2017. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  22. "Shiva Ahmadi and Sonya Clark Named a 2016 Recipient of the "Anonymous Was A Woman" Award". Cranbrook Academy of Art. 10 October 2016. Retrieved 10 March 2017.

"Artist Profile: Shiva Ahmadi". Asia Society. 23 June 2014. Retrieved 20 July 2017.

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