Tala Madani’s contribution to the biennial is an extension of her Corner Paintings series of diptychs. These paintings often depict projectors or lamps, which seem to cast light on the screen-like image on the adjacent canvas. They recall film auditoriums and analogue projectors, underlining the canvas as a site of projection and illumination. Corner Projection (Crowd Running) and Corner Projection (Lines) evoke crowds and congregations of people in dark spaces, each with their own source of light, illuminating a single, abstract, adjacent image. These works are accompanied by Madani’s animation, The Audience.
Tala Madani (b. 1981, Tehran, Iran) lives in Los Angeles. She makes paintings and animations whose indelible images bring together wide-ranging modes of critique, prompting reflection on gender, political authority, and questions of who and what gets represented in art. She has been the subject of solo exhibitions at a number of museums worldwide, including Portikus, Frankfurt, Germany (2019); La Panacée, Montpellier, France (2017); MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, Massachusetts (2016); Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis (2016); and Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, Seville, Spain (2014). Her work forms part of the permanent collections of institutions that include Moderna Museet, Stockholm and Malmö, Sweden; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Serralves Foundation, Porto; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Tate Modern, London; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.
EXHIBITED WORKS
Corner Projection (Crowd Running), 2019
Oil on linen
Diptych, each panel: 182.8
× 365.7 cm
Courtesy the artist and Pilar Corrias Gallery.
Presented with the support of Pilar Corrias Gallery.
Corner Projection (Making Lines), 2019
Oil on linen
Diptych
182.8 × 365.7 cm; 182.8 ×
182.8 cm
Courtesy the artist and Pilar Corrias Gallery.
Presented with the support of Pilar Corrias Gallery.
The Audience, 2018
Video
16’8”
Single channel colour animation with sound
Animation: Natalya Serebrennikova
Compositing: Will Ogilvie Sound
Courtesy the artist and Pilar Corrias Gallery.
Presented with the support of Pilar Corrias Gallery.
