Upcoming Exhibitions

*Group Show at Kravets/Wehby Gallery in New York, NY February, 2012

*To Live and Paint in L.A. @ The Torrance Art Museum Torrance, CA
January 21-March 10, 2012
Curated by Max Presneill and Jason Ramos

Artists: Jonathan Apgar, Rebecca Campbell, Daniela Campins, Alika Cooper, Tomory Dodge, Asad Faulwell, Jon Flack, Yvette Gellis, Iva Gueorguieva, Mary Addison Hackett, Carlson Hatton, Thomas Whittaker Kidd, Andy Kolar, Constance Mallison, Allison Miller, John Mills, Aaron Noble, Antonio Puleo, Alison Rash, Nano Rubio, Conrad Ruiz, John Seal, Ryan Sluggett, Comora Tolliver, Chris Trueman, Miller Updegraff, Grant Vetter, Ben White.

Torrance Art Museum

*Emerging Voices from Iran and Iranian Diaspora @ Art Asia Miami, FL
November 30-December 4th 2012
Curated by Kashya Hildebrand
Soody Sharifi, Hadieh Shafie, Aghighi Bakhshayeshi, Maryam Ashkanian, Asad Faulwell, Sissi Farassat

On Tap @ Bowmont Art Partners

I will have a small work in "On Tap" an invitational silent auction curated by Franklin Sirmans, Ali Subotnick, Dean Valentine, Lauri Firstenberg and Thomas Lawson. The silent auction will take place Thursday November 10th at Bowmont Art Partners. Click the link below for more information.

On Tap

Incredulous Zealots: 4 Painterly Interrogations from L.A. @ Josh Lilley Gallery Opening October 12th

Analia Saban, Annie Lapin, Asad Faulwell, Jeni Spota

Incredulous Zealots: 4 Painterly Interrogations from LA
Dates: 12th October – 19th November 2011
Private View: 11th October 2011, 6-8pm

Josh Lilley is delighted to announce the opening on Tuesday 11th October of Incredulous Zealots – a group exhibition featuring work by four LA-based artists - Analia Saban, Annie Lapin, Asad Faulwell, and Jeni Spota.

Lara Wisniewski, LA-based curator and writer, discusses their contribution to the Los Angeles art scene below;

Psychologically aggressive…zealously dedicated…relentlessly driven…exuding religious fervour; all apt phrases to describe the four young Los Angeles artists participating in this exhibition. Their work is driven by an obsession to paint and then maintain control of their medium – either through the way their ideas actuate themselves, or by controlling the material itself. It appears these four artists do not take any aspect of the painting process for granted, neither its history nor its physicality.

It might seem strange that an artist from Los Angeles would be so intense, so consumed by detail and control. How does so much tension manifest in endless stretches of sunny days? Then again, when we view these four young artists’ work, we have to remember their predecessors – Chris Burden, Paul McCarthy, Mike Kelley and Ed Ruscha etc – whose most innovative and outstanding works are psychologically disturbed, subtle, and sometimes not so subtle negotiations between strictures of reality and fantasy. Alternative religion also has its long history in the city; fanaticism and organisation are the earmarks of the Dianetics movement or the celebrity studded Kabbalah Centre, while smaller episodes found a voice – such as Charles Manson’s homegrown cult and its tragic, outrageous ending. It is hard to put a finger on the pulse that makes Los Angeles a home to these strange niches, as the city has always been a safe haven where outsiders become insiders by bringing dreams to their fullest expression. The eternally good weather seals their desires under a hopeful veneer that eventually cracks in the dry climate. As Los Angeles culture has proven, too many sunny days can beat shadows into the mind. LA’s dark underbelly is indeed a well-cultivated and fertile ground.

Josh Lilley Gallery

HEROES & VILLAINS @ Lawrie Shabibi Gallery

I will have three works in a group show at Lawrie Shabibi Gallery in Dubai U.A.E.

The show opens June 12th and runs until July 31st. Go to lawrieshabibi.com to see images of works in the show.

PRESS RELEASE

Lawrie Shabibi is pleased to present its summer exhibition HEROES & VILLAINS, a group exhibition that embodies Lawrie Shabibi's commitment to presenting a diverse range of artistic talent from the wider Middle East region. Who are today's heroes? Who are the villains? In 2011, the year of change, the answer to this has never been less clear. Those who we adulate one minute might repulse us the next. Heroes commit villainous acts and yet even villains can redeem themselves. The very idea that they were ever villains at all depends on perspective and timing. In the fast-paced changes in today's world, the absolutes in politics and morality are exposed as illusory, expeditious and ambivalent. HEROES & VILLAINS explores these grey areas in vivid colour, demonstrating the heady mix of glamour, drama, melodrama and grit that characterizes our notions of heroism and villainy. A number of the artists selected for the show have never been exhibited in Dubai before. This includes Afghan video artist and photographer Gazelle Samizay, whose work explores the intersection of her Afghan heritage and American upbringing through her status as a woman; the Iranian artist Asad Faulwell, whose new works of intricately woven collages celebrate the largely unsung female freedom fighters who struggled to end French occupation in Algeria; Aicha Hamu, the Moroccan/French multi-disciplinary artist here presenting a stunning polyptych of Elizabeth Taylor and her seven husbands; Katayoun Vaziri whose nationalist Iranian posters of the 80'sa are manipulated by the general public; and the extraordinary graphic scenes of urban decay by the young Egyptian Ali Abdel Mohsen. Other artists included are Zena El-Khalil, whose densely-wrought collages composed of toys and political images are her way of making sense of the turmoil in her native Lebanon; Yasam Sasmazer, the young Turkish sculptor whose haunting yet appealing images of children have been causing a sensation; Farsad Labbauf, who paints figures with an almost calligraphic touch, and whose work can be found in the Saatchi Collection and Marwan Sahmarani, the 2010 Abraaj Capital Art Prize winner.

New Work: Les Femmes D'Alger #4 48x36

Upcoming and Recent Shows

*Group Show at Lawrie/Shabibi Gallery in Dubai U.A.E. opening June 12th (more info forthcoming).

*"Dis(Locating) Culture" curated by Reem Al-Alusi w/ Shoja Azari, Anouka Faruqee, Amir Fallah, Asad Faulwell, Sandow Birk, Farideh Leshai, Shiva Ahmadi, Jowhara Alsaud, and Negar Ahkami. The show runs from April 15th - July 30th in Pittsburgh, PA at Michael Berger Gallery.

*Solo Show at Kravets/Wehby Gallery in New York, NY. Opening Saturday February 26th.

*"Pieceable Kingdom" w/ Erin Cosgrove, Asad Fauwlell, Maxwell Hendler, Laura Krifka, Mimi Lauter, Devon Troy Strother, and Matt Wedel at Beacon Arts in Inglewood, CA. This show is curated by David Pagel. Opening February 5th. Curator/Artist Panel Discussion March 6th.

*"Staging Identity" w/ Haleh Anvari, Gohar Dashti, Asad Faulwell, Sissi Farassati, Shadi Ghadirian and Malekeh Nayiny at Gallerie Kashya Hildebrand in Zurich, Switzerland. Show runs from March 10th - April 16th

*ArtDubai March 16th-19th

*"Revolutionaries" curated by Kirk Pedersen w/Oscar Magallanes, Asad Faulwell, ABCNT and CRYPTIK. Opening Saturday April 9th @ Pedersen Projects in Pomona, CA

*I have been named one of six artists awarded the "Visions From a New California" artist grant/residency for 2011. Click here for more information

*I have also been shortlisted for the MOP Contemporary Art Prize based in London.

ArtForum Review

A thoughtful review of my show at Kravets/Wehby by Alpesh Kantilal Patel.

03.11.11

Author: Alpesh Kantilal Patel

02.26.11-04.02.11 Kravets / Wehby

Algerian women have served as muses for artists as diverse as Eugène Delacroix, Pablo Picasso, and, more recently, Lalla Essaydi. In his first New York solo exhibition, appropriately titled “Les Femmes D’Alger” (Women of Algeria), Los Angeles–based artist Asad Faulwell deifies the largely unsung female freedom fighters who struggled from 1954 to 1962 to end French occupation in the African nation. As Frantz Fanon writes so eloquently in his book A Dying Colonialism (1959), these women were often called upon to plant bombs in the French sections of cities because they could enter without detection if wearing European dress.

In his painting Les Femmes D’Alger 3, 2011, the starkly rendered black-and-white face of one of these activists, Djamila Bouhired, stares out at the viewer and dominates the canvas, while thin bands of color and decorative motifs flow out from her eyes and connect to an intricately drawn background of florid shapes and patterns. The union of the somber portrait and these latter forms––reminiscent of the 1970s Pattern and Decoration movement, itself heavily influenced by traditional Moroccan textiles and Persian motifs––evokes both the exuberance of life and the specter of death associated with her heroic acts.

With Les Femmes D’Alger, 2010, Faulwell depicts a three-quarter-length portrait of Zohra Drif, who was sentenced to twenty years in prison for her role in a bombing in 1957 but was eventually pardoned at the end of the war. Her strong, handsome face is rendered in a muted palette while colorful, decorative shapes and patterns cover her dress and eyes in a style evocative of Gustav Klimt’s, particularly his beautifully intriguing portraits of lone women. The balance between surface and psychological depth Faulwell achieves in the above pieces veers towards the purely decorative in Danielle Minne, 2010, and Mujahidat #11, 2011, paintings in which the portraits are completely hidden within floral and starburst shapes. These works might serve as metaphors for the manner in which these revolutionary women once seamlessly blended into the background.

"Les Femmes D'Alger" Kravets/Wehby

Les Femmes D'Alger @ Kravets/Wehby Gallery Opening February 26th

My first solo show in New York will be opening on February 26th at Kravets/Wehby Gallery.
Les Femmes D'Alger
February 26th - April 2, 2011
Opening: February 26th 6-8 pm

Pieceable Kingdom curated by David Pagel Opening Saturday!

Opening Saturday February 5th 6-9
@ The Beacon Arts Building 808 N. La Brea Ave. Inglewood, CA