The artists selected for this exhibition reflect the complexity and the variety of the researches that take place now in totally various contexts which have in common the fact of being facets of the same crystal called “Arab speaking world », from Bahrain to Egypt, from Kuwait to Iraq. Using in many cases a language filled with a faked optimism generated by Pop imaginary, the nine artists Rashid Al Khalifa, Sadik Al Afriji, Obaidi, Shurooq Amin, Khaled Hafez, Alia Al Farsi, Ahmed El Shaer, Simeen Farhat, Haytham Nawar, do not hesitate to tackle burning and complex topics, such as war, powerful people’s raise and fall and women issues. They move nimbly among different media, from painting to video and installation, from language to image, so that to include narratives, dramas and even unique epics, that feed diversified projects, always in dialogue with western gazes and expressive means. In the Eye of the Thunderstorm: Effervescent Practices from the Arab World and Asia, curated by Martina Corgnati, is commissioned by Contemporary Practices Art Journal, a publication – or rather a textual project space – that has for ten years positioned itself as tireless and open-minded watchdog on the reality of the artists who are acting in this area of the world.
