SALT presents a comprehensive exhibition of works by artist, musician and writer Hassan Khan on September 21, 2012–January 6, 2013.
Hassan Khan, Blind Ambition, 2012. Airbrushed silicone sculpture, from The Agreement Image courtesy of the artist and Galerie Chantal Crousel. Photograph by Kristien Daem
Hassan Khan (1975) lives and works in Cairo, Egypt and before beginning to regularly exhibit his work in art spaces in the late 1990s, he was involved in a self-organized, underground art and music scene that was highly innovative, yet rarely public. Collaborating with others and working alone to express a contemporary cultural perspective that was alternative to the mainstream, Khan is considered, within that context, a pioneering influence, particularly in the fields of experimental music and video.
Khan’s interdisciplinary methods of artistic production rely on observations, interactions, engagements, as well as a more personal internalized source of communication. He channels these experiences via a multifaceted layering of video, digital animation, performance documentation, sculpture, text and language, photography, sound and installation to produce a very personal, yet formal language.
Despite Khan’s growing international recognition, including participation this year in dOCUMENTA (13) and frequent performances of original compositions around the world, Hassan Khan at SALT Beyoğlu will be his first major one-person retrospective exhibition. It brings together works dating from the 1990s to 2012 including early pieces not seen before or only previously shared in Egypt. The exhibition includes the video Lungfan (a collaboration with Amr Hosny) not exhibited since 1995 and the installation Dom Tak Tak Dom Tak (2005) only previously shown in Torino, Italy in 2005 and 2007; as well as highly acclaimed video works The Hidden Location (2004), Jewel (2010) and Muslimgauze R.I.P. (2010). Many of the selected works will be presented in the same venue for the first time offering an opportunity to fully comprehend the diversity and development of Khan’s practice. – www.saltonline.org