Ifa Galerie

In the series of "Islamic Worlds", the ifa-Galleries Stuttgart and Berlin present the exhibition "Layers of Time and Space", developed in collaboration with the Austrian curator Simone Wille. It will show artists from Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. Some of the artists live in South Asia, others in Europe or America. Their common goal in their artistic work is to tackle the changes in their respective social realities in various ways. On the one hand, this reality is characterised by upholding traditional values, on the other hand by the tendency towards Western, American products, habits, and possibly even values. The invited artists have crossed political, cultural and religious borders within their own society as well as beyond it, some of them have broken taboos in order to develop their individual strategies and artistic means of expression viable for a life between tradition, conventions and an international idiom. Since the young generation of artists from the 1980s and 1990s had not been confronted with the personal experience of colonialism, the search for a national and cultural identity is less problematic for them as for the older generation..

Many younger artists from Pakistan, India or Bangladesh orient themselves by the international art scene as a matter of course, coping with a language of form or contents that are being discussed worldwide. However, they bring these global questions in relation to their own, rich and newly discovered culture. This culture as well as questions of religious and ethnical identity are being spotlighted critically.

The exhibition "Layers of Time and Space" presents a refreshing survey of contemporary art from South Asia, which deals with the found patterns and traditions in a self-confident manner and which realises new, intercultural perspectives in the creative process. It invites us to call common stereotypes into question and to reconsider our own perspectives on other cultures and religions.

Exhibition catalogue: 72 pages with several texts and numerous illustrations, at a price of 9 Euro.

ifa-gallery Berlin
October 21 – December 18, 2005
January 2 – January 21, 2006
Opening:
Thursday, October 20, 2005, 7 p.m.

Press preview:
Thursday, October 20, 2005, 11 a.m.

Opening hours:
Tuesday – Thursday, Sunday
2 – 7. p.m.
Friday / Saturday 2 – 9 p.m.
Closed on Mondays and Holidays

ifa-gallery Stuttgart
February 24 – May 7, 2006

Eröffnung:
Thursday, February 23, 2006, 6 p.m.

Press preview:
Thursday, February 23, 2006, 11 a.m.

Opening hours:
Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 12 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Thursday 12 a.m. – 8 p.m.
Saturday/Sunday 11 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Closed on Mondays and Holidays

© Hamra Abbas: MoMa is the Star, 2004