"Up Next" Nima Abehenar
For April 2021 we welcomed Nima Abekenar to do a project in our space. He would often visit us in our studio to brainstorm how he would change the space. Much of Abekenar’s work is about effecting the physical space in which a work of art exists in.
This in turn becomes his work. With past installations he has done this by flooding a space or bringing new architectural elements into existing ones. With ASAP he decided to not only do this physically but conceptually, taking into consideration what ASAP operates as; a project space.
With that in mind he transformed our space by building a wall close to the window to display paintings that seemingly advertise the next artist. He locked the door, not allowing guests within the tight space. This created a barrier as if it is an in between show “advertisement” not an actual work of art.
NIMA ABKENAR is a conceptual artist from Iran. In his work, he explores the subtleties of social phenomenon and political events. His dislocation from his native home at 17 has shaped his contextual and conceptual views in art and sociology. In his latest work "The Case of Burning a Flag", Abkenar displays a burning Israeli flag, and seeks the unbiased ground of the observer to ontologically execute the complexity of this social-political phenomenon in the context of the artist’s inevitable consequential connection to the event.
Nima’s interest in context has bounded his art practice with alternative non-art spaces such as commercial buildings and abandoned warehouses. For his latest collaboration with Black Mountain Institute, Believer Festival, he created a site specific light installation 1200; using 1200 gallons of water to contextualize the monumental quality of water.
For the past five years Nima Abkenar has collaborated with art entities such as Black Mountain Institute, D-well, AG gallery, and City of Las Vegas Office of Cultural Affairs to create installations and develop public art projects both nationally and in his home country, Iran.
