Narges Mohammadi

Narges Mohammadi, NL/AF, 1992, (lives and works in The Hague, NL) is an artist, curator and DJ. After studying art history, modern and contemporary art at the University of Utrecht, she studied Fine Arts at the KABK in The Hague. Her artistic practice stems from a position of in-betweenness – a so-called in-between space embedded in cultural histories, which she translates into installations and sculptures. Her works are characterized by a play with scents, colors, symbols and customs of different cultural heritages. By using simple and widely accessible materials in an environment they have seemingly outgrown, she allows different experiences of the “home” to converge. In addition to her artistic practice, she has worked as a freelance curator for (A)WAKE, New Radicalism and Queering the Church, among others, and is part of the international queer artist collective beuys bois. Her work is included in the collection of Museum Voorlinden and the Art Collection of the Amsterdam UMC. She has participated in exhibitions in Framer Framed, Galerie Ron Mandos, Het HEM, Kunstverein Wagenhallen (DE), Villa Mondriaan and Academiegalerie Utrecht.

Instagram: nrgs_momadi

     

In gratitude, wooden construction and plaster, 2.4m x 2.90m x 3.30m, 2021 (Photo’s Ivonne Zijp)

(Description of work) Walking up and down the staircases of Omstand – there are steps in the front and in the back of the space, wich reminded Narges of the few staircase steps at her own door when she was little. You could walk up the three steps untill there was a platform on which you could reach the front door.  Some years later, when we could finally set foot in a a genuine house, far away from the caravan houses in the asylum centre – we had a real staircase. Before those steps, I had no idea of what I was missing before. How could I have known the joy of running up and down the twelve staircase steps before I was actually being able to run on them?
With In gratitude I refer to this moment of understanding what is there when it suddenly is not there anymore. I asked myself, how can I make visible what is, and perhaps forever will be, lost? Are we able to visualise that what is invisible to our eyes, but known to our bodies? More than our minds, our bodies let us remember –  In gratitude is a mold that could never be casted, a staircase that can never be fully reached it’s twelve steps, a door that can never be closed and a size that could never be reassured. Regardless.