Opening on 5th October 2017
On view until 22nd October 2017

In “Recliners” I search for absenteeism and loss; a process of research, fabrication and creation. The experience of fantasizing in solitude was the igniting point for this series of work. Contemplation and visualization based on the traces that informed me of “an event that had occurred in the past”. Graffitis, sheets and fabrics that were signifying a connection between the triangle of love, body and beauty.
It was very much like my experiences at the time when I was studying painting. When confronted with art books instead of seeing I was forced to fantasize. To imagine nudes that were horridly covered and could not be seen. A reminder of beautiful women and men that I imagined and the gratifying and rapturous magic that would engulf me. But this was only a defensive mechanism, because it would change my perception of the image.
The main question is: once nudes that are painted to be seen, are altered, what will be the point of our “gaze”?
In this series by fictitious rendering of the factual, I invite you to speculate on reality. Imagining reclining nudes in the middle of out of the way and abandoned spaces and pristine forests of Iran, where there are traces of humans, and there is not. At the same time, they are and are not human images.
Raoof Dashti