Los-Angeles based mostly artist Amir H. Fallah has at all times taken the “more-is-more” strategy to portray. “I actually simply attempt to cram the whole lot in there that I can,” he says. It stands to motive, then, that his first institutional solo exhibition within the metropolis, The Fallacy of Borders on the Fowler Museum on the College of California, Los Angeles, looks like a love letter to maximalism itself, a meditation on the electrical noise of an more and more interconnected age.
Fallah, who was born in Tehran on the peak of the Islamic Revolution, mines the diasporic Iranian American expertise by way of the spirit of remix, drawing on traditions as disparate as Seventeenth-century Flemish still-lifes and graffiti to attain a vibrant depth of that means in his work. Fallah’s shouldn’t be a follow of rote metaphor; because the title of the present suggests, his artwork eschews boundaries, materials and cultural alike, in service of weirder, wilder ends.
They Will Say a Assortment of Untruths (2022) critiques the promise of co-existence of individuals from totally different non secular, cultural and non secular backgrounds, and warns that regardless of beliefs of peace and concord, false narratives proceed to be constructed on the idea of religion, race and gender Picture: Alan Shaffer; courtesy of the artist and Shulamit Nazarian, Los Angeles
“This exhibition spotlights Fallah’s broad visible literacy, experimental drive and inventive receptivity—all anchored in his migrant expertise,” says curator Amy Landau, the director of interpretation and schooling on the Fowler Museum. “He narrates from trauma and celebration, in addition to his roles as a husband, father and confidant, which lends a deeply humane side to his social critique.”
Organised round eight totally different “thematic modes”, The Fallacy of Borders tracks Fallah’s creative evolution from a teenage zine-maker and writer of Lovely/Decay, the journal and ebook sequence highlighting the early 2000s avant-garde, to his profession as a multidisciplinary artist and grasp storyteller. He spoke with The Artwork Newspaper about his ideas on collaboration, misinterpretation and visible archaeology.
The Artwork Newspaper: Are you able to discuss the way in which the Lovely/Decay archive is centred on this exhibition?
Amir H. Fallah: I used to be really shocked that the curator, Amy Landau, wished to incorporate the Lovely/Decay archive within the present. I began making this zine not pre-internet however on the web pre-social media, and sourcing the imagery I’d use from graffiti and different subcultures I wished to discover. She was the one who made the connection between the work I’m making now, like my newer grid work, and this undertaking I began all the way in which again in highschool, just like the layering of various references and the maximalism. I’ve at all times considered myself as a form of archaeologist, researching and attempting to find new angles. Apparently I’ve been doing these items since I used to be 16! I by no means actually considered it that method, however seeing it by way of her eyes helped me actually see what all of this has been about because the starting.
I by no means need to find yourself in a state of affairs the place I’m simply making copies of myself, or a viewer can predict what I’m going to do subsequent
The present options 4 stained-glass home windows you created with Judson Studios in Los Angeles. How does collaboration match into your follow?
Oh, collaboration is so necessary, actually. A very powerful half about being an artist is being curious, I believe, and being keen to strive one thing new. I’ve at all times been actually interested in something and the whole lot; the truth that I’m doing a present with a museum that has such a big archive meant that I might actually get deep into researching and deciding on objects that talk to one another. I by no means need to find yourself in a state of affairs the place I’m simply making copies of myself, or a viewer can predict what I’m going to do subsequent. I believe it’s additionally helpful to take dangers or, in case you strive one thing new, to really threat it being dangerous or not working. I actually have a “more-is-more” strategy to my items, and together with extra parts helps a broader vary of individuals navigate the data within the work or sculptures or no matter it’s they’re taking a look at.
Within the tondo portray Cowgirl (2020), Fallah attracts on the romanticised imaginative and prescient of the American West that hid the brutal therapy of Indigenous individuals Picture: Alan Shaffer; courtesy of the artist and Shulamit Nazarian, Los Angeles
What do you suppose is least understood about your work?
Individuals generally don’t perceive that I perceive how the work is functioning. They see one thing they suppose is simply too illustrative, or graphic, or too vibrant and vibrant, and don’t essentially get that the maximalism and color is a seduction, it’s a method of luring viewers into the deeper political messaging of the work. It’s a really intentional aesthetic selection; I need plenty of totally different sorts of viewers to have the ability to get one thing out of the work, whether or not it’s cultural hybridity or artwork historical past or one thing extra subversive. The methods I’m utilizing are very a lot on goal, and the work has plenty of totally different layers that viewers can work together with.
• Amir H. Fallah: The Fallacy of Borders, Fowler Museum, UCLA, till 14 Might
• Amir H. Fallah: A Battle on Wars, Shulamit Nazarian, till 25 March
