Huma Bhabha, Maker of Magnificent Monsters, Joins David Zwirner
Other artists joining new galleries this month include Jordan Wolfson, Maysha Mohamedi, and Suchitra Mattai.
Huma Bhabha, Untitled (2021). Ink, acrylic, pastel, and collage on paper. 127 x 127 cm. Courtesy the Artist and Xavier Hufkens. Photo: Adam Reich.
Global mega-gallery David Zwirner yesterday announced its representation of New York-based Pakistani artist Huma Bhabha.
Born in Karachi in 1962, Bhabha creates works suggestive of aliens, cryptozoological creatures, and ancient civilisations. In addition to paintings, she casts bronze monuments from forms she initially sculpts in cheap, ubiquitous materials such as cork and polystyrene.
'Huma Bhabha's art making has always struck me as truly singular,' said David Zwirner in a statement. 'Her formal references, which can take you back to the very beginning of sculpture as well as into the future, are often jarring and dissonant, yet always project an otherworldly beauty.'
Writing for Ocula Magazine, Stephanie Bailey said Bhabha's otherworldly works 'cut to the heart of the artist's focus, which draws on her experience of living in the United States and having to contend with her own otherness.'
Bhabha participated in the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015 and the Whitney Biennial in 2010. She has held solo shows at MoMA PS1 and The Contemporary Austin, among many other institutions.
She will continue to be represented by David Kordansky Gallery in Los Angeles and Xavier Hufkens in Brussels, and develop special projects with Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn, founder of New York gallery Salon 94.
In another noteworthy move this month, Gagosian announced shared representation of Jordan Wolfson alongside Sadie Coles HQ and David Zwirner.
Born in New York in 1980, Wolfson is known for works that use everything from acrylics to animatronics to create what he has described as 'byproducts of culture', and especially the Internet. In a 2020 article, The New Yorker described his practice as 'edgelord art'.
Wolfson is now based in Los Angeles, where he sometimes partners with special effects workshops. His work was exhibited at the Whitney Biennial in 2017, and resides in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, Tate, London, and many others.
Other artists who gained new representation this month include colour-field painter Maysha Mohamedi and Vietnamese abstract painter Huong Dodinh at Pace Gallery, British portrait painter Sahara Longe at Timothy Taylor, London and New York, and Guyanese multimedia artist Suchitra Mattai at Kavi Gupta, Chicago. —[O]
