< Previous40 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 SSitting across the screen from me in the offi ce workspace of his studio, Jason Seife smiled humbly as I complimented his work. I could not resist admiring the intricate tattoos that spiralled from the fi ngers of both hands, all the way up to the upper arms. The fl ora and fauna designs with paisley borders mimic his signature carpet paintings. I wondered who the tattoo artist was as I also imagined how anxious they must have been to draw such meticulous work in the presence of an artist renowned for his remarkable attention to detail. Upon fi rst encounter, Seife is not what he appears to be. With spiky platinum peroxide hair and fully-tattooed arms, he resembles the lead guitarist of a rock band instead of a professional artist. He spoke in a gentle voice and I detected the slight trace of an unmistakeable Middle Eastern streak; that when a man averts a direct gaze when speaking to you to show respect and humility. Born in Miami to a Cuban mother and a Syrian father, he is the defi nition of eclectic. His aunt, whom he had spent plenty of time with, is married to a fi rst-generation Iranian immigrant. His childhood friends and neighbours included Hispanic, Black and Asian Americans by virtue of the cosmopolitan make-up of his city. Like a dry sponge, Seife absorbed it all. He developed a mighty ability to move fl uidly between his Middle Eastern and Caribbean heritage as well as display an uncommon understanding of other cultures. “There is so much in common,” he assures me. “You know the Islamic Empire spread all the way to Spain in Andalusia. Some of the food they took with them then to the colonies. So, in fact, it is the same dish with a Caribbean name,” he enthuses as he explains to me the origin of the Cuban Tabaquitos, the stuffed vine leaves dish that carries the exact recipe as the Middle Eastern Warak Enab and the Syrian Yebra. Like many second and third generation immigrants, Seife and his siblings adopted a hybrid cultural identity which often made them Above: Artist Jason Seife. Right: Jason Seife. Valleys (My Love). 2019. 152cmx100cm. Courtesy of the artist oblivious to their home country’s racial issues. “When I started growing older and travelling around the US, I recognised the difference,” he recalls how some of his fellow Americans regarded him as an ‘other’. At the age of 19 Seife chose to forgo art for a life on the road, playing guitar with his music band after being rejected from his dream art-centric magnet school. The rejection marked a turning point in his planned artistic path. Ironically, it has also proven to be the catalyst that helped propel his professional art career. “After playing with bands for so long, I realised how much I miss drawing,” he explains his slow transition back into the art world through graphic design. Having cultivated a network within the The ARTIST HBA_040_38-45_TheArtist_Jason Seife_11379181.indd 4001/10/2020 05:37:23 PM41 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 Jason Seife. Nucleus. 2018. Sharjah Art Museum HBA_040_38-45_TheArtist_Jason Seife_11379181.indd 4101/10/2020 05:37:29 PM42 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 The ARTIST Jason Seife. Writings on The Wall installation. 2018. Solo show at Montor12 Brussels HBA_040_38-45_TheArtist_Jason Seife_11379181.indd 4201/10/2020 05:37:35 PM43 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 HBA_040_38-45_TheArtist_Jason Seife_11379181.indd 4301/10/2020 05:37:42 PMW ORD S B Y HANIA AFIFI. IMA GES C OUR TES Y OF THE AR TIS T 44 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 music fi eld, Seife designed logos, merchandise and album covers for musicians and pop artists. This included Big Sean’s iconic lion logo, Nicki Minaj’s video backdrop and Pharrell Williams and Mac Miller’s album cover for the single GLOW, to name a few. The money gained from these commissions helped fund his studio and fi rst round of carpet paintings in 2016. “I grew up with carpets all around me,” he says. “In my house and in my aunt’s house, my grandmother has some on the walls. They were a staple in our homes and for my high school project, I chose carpet design.” The positive reception of his painted carpets encouraged him to dive deeper into this new style of painting. He fi rst travelled to Morocco and Turkey and when he was fi nally granted the visa to travel to Iran in 2018, he visited the carpet weavers of Isfahan, Kashan and Shiraz to understand the symbolism used in their work. He also made a trip to Syria in 2019 to see fi rst-hand the celebrated Syrian marquetry woodwork and pearl inlays. “The funny thing is, when I showed those weavers and artisans my work, they were so impressed, but it is I who is so impressed with the incredible work they do,” he expresses. Seife does not simply copy the patterns on the Persian rugs. He selects motifs and elements from different rugs and mixes them together to create a hybrid design. So, an Isfahan medallion can be combined with a Kashan border and the colours of a Shirazi rug to communicate his own mood and message. In his later paintings, he began removing sections of the rug-paint to expose the gravel and cement-mix base on which he paints his rugs. “In Tehran and in Damascus you see all those grey concrete buildings,” he explains. “So, I was inspired to recreate them as slabs and use them as the canvas for my paintings.” The results are what appear to be aged and distressed rugs mimicking the type of rugs he saw at the Tehran Carpet Museum. The concrete slabs also paved the way for 3D surfaces including cubes and ceiling drops. Chief amongst them is the colossal 304x213cm ceiling-suspended oil rug painting of Firdaus which was displayed as part of an immersive installation called Nucleus at the Sharjah Art Museum in 2018. When asked for his thoughts on ‘art for art’s sake’, he replies, “Before visiting Iran and the other countries, I would have said everyone is free to do art out of sheer passion. I mean, I understand that they say this because they are not producing art for money, but now that I visited those places, I think there is a social element to it,” he pauses, “like a responsibility.” Seife’s artwork has reignited interest in the seemingly neglected traditional Middle Eastern arts and crafts. By migrating the art of oriental rug-making to a new medium, he has repurposed it for the contemporary lifestyle. This, in turn, is encouraging young people to take up the craftsmanship and Western homeowners who believed that highly decorative oriental rugs have no place in contemporary aesthetic to reconsider the art for their living spaces. ■ jason-seife.com Seife’s new solo exhibition will take place at Unit London Gallery in the UK in Jan 2021. Italian debut at Museo Carlo Bilotti in Rome, Italy in 2021 (exact date TBD). The ARTIST Jason Seife. Moon Under Water. Detail shot. 2020. Courtesy of the artist HBA_040_38-45_TheArtist_Jason Seife_11379181.indd 4401/10/2020 05:37:49 PM45 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 Jason Seife. Round Rug. 2020. Courtesy of the artist HBA_040_38-45_TheArtist_Jason Seife_11379181.indd 4501/10/2020 05:37:55 PMRev ealing a reinterpretation of surreal ism and folk lor e wi th in th e po st -in te rn et gen erati on, Kuwa iti artist Alymamah Rashed ’s biom orp hic paintings explore the conte mpo rar y Mu slim a Cy bo rg TH E TH IRD BOD Y Words by IMAN VAKIL The ARTIST HBA_040_46-53_TheArtist_Alymamah Al Awadhi_11384318.indd 4601/10/2020 05:38:40 PM47 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 Facing page: Alymamah Rashed. I am the truth (detail). 2018; This page: My Eyes Will Listen To Your Forgotten Promises (Do not go anywhere without me). 2020. Courtesy of the artist HBA_040_46-53_TheArtist_Alymamah Al Awadhi_11384318.indd 4701/10/2020 05:38:46 PMike the memories she seeks to emulate, Alymamah Rashed’s paintings are both vivid and hazy. In almost violent fl eshy tones, a sea of red fi ngertips reach out and rouged lips smear across the canvas. Translucent and devoid of features, bodies are washes of colour that leak into each other, or curl around carpets, fences and ouds, anchored into fables and narratives. Mimicking the ephemeral forms that memory takes on and the distorted sense of time and logic in the act of recollection, Alymamah’s layered fi gures are her shedded and compounded past selves, hybridising to reach spiritual attainment. “The fi rst body is the fl eshed body and the second body is the thobe, and the combination of the two, the third body, is what I emit on the canvas,” the artist explains. “This is what I call the Muslima Cyborg. It is cyborgian not in the mechanical sense, but it refers to spiritual intelligence, as a motor, or a form of technology, as opposed to artifi cial intelligence and programming.” Alymamah’s distinctive practice and contemplations of the contemporary ‘Muslima’ body began to take form during her temporary emigration, while attending the School of Visual Art for her BFA and Parsons School of Design for her MFA, both on scholarship in New York. “I was the only Arab woman in the department,” she recalls. “No one really got where I’m coming from and I was pigeonholed, learning about my culture through a Western lens. That didn’t sit well with me.” Instead, in a similar fashion to the techniques of securing chance encounters with objects separated from their functions in fl ea markets, Alymamah frequented second-hand bookstores in the search of 48 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 Alymamah Rashed. Will you guard my truth? 2020. Oil on canvas. Courtesy of the artist HBA_040_46-53_TheArtist_Alymamah Al Awadhi_11384318.indd 4801/10/2020 05:38:52 PM49 HarpersBazaarArabia.com/Culture/Art Autumn 2020 The ARTIST Alymamah Rashed. When I Escaped From The Sound Of Your Hills (your name is upon my tongue) . 2020. Oil on canvas. Courtesy of the artist HBA_040_46-53_TheArtist_Alymamah Al Awadhi_11384318.indd 4901/10/2020 05:38:58 PMNext >