Art Basel Miami Beach

Kamrooz Aram
Rebecca Ward

Galleries Sector: Booth F16
Miami Beach Convention Center
VIP Days: November 29 - 30, 2022
Public Days: December 1 - 3, 2022

Kamrooz Aram (b. 1978, Shiraz, Iran) has developed a rich practice that reconsiders the complicated position of non-Western decorative art within the trajectory of Modernism. Oftentimes referencing traditional Persian aesthetics and rooted primarily in painting, he expands his artistic production to incorporate found images and sculpture into the medium. Aram frequently references the exoticized arabesque in his work while challenging the notion of it as a superfluous art form. Enclosing the organic forms in framing borders that are pulled from grids in a process of drawing and erasure, this heightens the connection to the ornamental while renegotiating its subordinated role within Western abstraction. A sense of timelessness permeates his work while also calling into question notions of what constitutes Modernism.

Solo museum exhibitions include The Arts Club of Chicago (2022), The FLAG Art Foundation, New York (2018) and Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas (2018). Group museum exhibitions include Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney (2020) and Victoria and Albert Museum, London (2018).

Rebecca Ward (b. 1984, Texas, USA) investigates painting’s multifaceted relationships with object, craft, and dimensionality through deconstructed and sewn canvases. In her polychromatic paintings, distinct formal elements emerge from Ward’s investigations into geometry and the body, oftentimes creating an ambiguity between the two. These elements coalesce into a spatial play of harmonious proportions and tones that emphasize materiality and process. The artist converges cut planes of painted and dyed canvas at machine-sewn seams that both physically combine and divide the compositions. Foreground and background are accentuated by light washes or raw canvas contrasting with saturated tones, which give way to an unraveling of the picture in areas where she methodically removes sections of threads. Revealing and obscuring the underlying stretcher bars, Ward emphasizes the sculptural structure of painting.

Solo museum exhibitions include SITE Santa Fe, New Mexico (2022), The FLAG Art Foundation, New York (2017), and Ex Chiesetta, Bari, Italy (2015). Group museum exhibitions include The Courtauld Institute of Art, London (2016), Camden Arts Center, London (2016), and SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, Georgia (2015).