Ghada Amer

1963 (Caire)
Living in : New-York
Working in : New-York
Artist's webSite
Artist's gallery

Influenced by abstract expressionism, she left painting after a stay in Egypt to adopt a medium at the same time artisanal and feminine: embroidery. For Ghada Amer, abstraction is the major expression of masculinity in art history in the 20th century. This is why she integrates a feminine universe into her work through embroidery. Domestic activities are generally a prejudice that is attributed to women, Ghada Amer reclaims them and transpose them into art as for example with the use of sewing. This Egyptian artist who traveled in France, in the United States is very attached to the themes of woman, narrative, language, translation... In 1991-92, in Five Women at Work, she represented domestic life. In 1998, in Private Rooms, she embroidered passages from the Koran that address women’s issues. In Encyclopedia of Pleasure, she takes up a medieval Arab treatise on pleasure. Since 2010, she has been working with Reza Farkhondeh. In 2012, she used works from Western art history (Ingres, Picasso) that were painted for a heterosexual male audience and voyeur4. In 2018, an exhibition in Tours is based on an installation composed of cactus, and about twenty embroidered canvases. His choice of medium such as embroidery favors a technique used for a long time by women, rather than painting with gouache or oil.



Artist's issues


Issue 26
Issue 54








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