The Baku-born and, since 2015, Berlin-based artist enjoys pushing the limits of perception. Her images possess thoroughly mannerist characteristics – the ground and parts of the body repeatedly dissolve into bluish-yellow streaks, clouds…
The Baku-born and, since 2015, Berlin-based artist enjoys pushing the limits of perception. Her images possess thoroughly mannerist characteristics – the ground and parts of the body repeatedly dissolve into bluish-yellow streaks, clouds and fields of colour. Shamsi varies her themes but not her painting style, whose palette and ductus are characterised by typical and easily identifiable elements. The cream-like colours, constantly contrasted by dark tones of grey and realistically rendered details, are truly amazing, as if parts of the image have been transformed into molten ice cream! Shamsi gives the space free rein, confuses our usual routines and ways of seeing, emphasises two-dimensionality and accentuates the depicted scenes through ellipses and omissions.
Astro-Horse is a perfect example: a splendidly shimmering horse wearing a flexible astronaut’s helmet and gazing into a floating mirror sphere in which we can see a horse’s head without a helmet looking at us. We would not be wrong in pointing out that, in this way, the picture’s virtual viewer – meaning us – is indirectly proclaimed a horse.
Shamsi chooses her titles carefully, often in Latin, in order to give her works a sense of sophistication. She imbues her art with adventures as well as with deeper mysteries and cultural meaning. There are clear references to art history and classical surrealist modernism, but at the same time she is constantly reworking its themes in a highly original manner. In fact, with its unique questions of perception, her Astro-Horse recalls one of the classics of the early modern relationship between image and viewer, one that many academics and intellectuals have attempted to analyse: Diego Velázquez’s courtly painting Las Meninas.
Stephan Reisner
VITA
2003-2007
Berufsfachschule für Malerei «A. AsimZade» bei der Aserbeidschanischen Kunstakademie
2007-2011
Studium der Bühnenmalerei an der Aserbaidschanischen Staatlichen Universität für Kultur und Kunst. Diplom mit Auszeichnung
2015-2018
Weißensee Kunsthochschule Berlin, Studien gang Freie Kunst / Bildhauerei bei Prof. Else Gabriel. Diplom mit Auszeichnung
2018-2020
Meisterschülerin, bei Prof. Albrecht Schäfer und Prof. Else Gabriel an der Weißensee Kunsthochschule Berlin
Exhibitions
Solo Exhibitions
2022
Exhibition "Frack, Cut, Smoking - Stylish from the evening reception to the German Bundestag ́ ́ for the company Cut For You, Berlin
Aserbaidschanischen Kulturhauses Khari Bülbül e.V., Hotel Waldorf Astoria, Berlin
2014
Adam & Eva, Ardes Galerie, Berlin
2009
Role Models - Women Daring to Change, Women's Association for Rational Development, Baku, Azerbaijan
Group Exhibitions
2022
Discovery Art Fair Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main
Weihnachtsausstellung 2022 der Stiftung Starke, Löwenpalais, Berlin
UN PEZZO DI ME, Transform Galerie, Berlin
2021
21 Expressions, Online exhibition, organized by Faculty of Fine Art, National Academy of Arts, Culture and Heritage (ASWARA), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia und ArtFort, Indien
Die Kulturelle Luftbrücke, Kühlhaus, Berlin
2020
Jedem Anfang wohnt ein Zauber inne, Transform studio & Galerie, Berlin
2019
Artistic meetings, Jüdische Gemeinde zu Berlin – Familienzentrum ZION, The New Synagogue, Berlin
Weihnachtsausstellung 2019 der Stiftung Starke, Löwenpalais, Berlin
2018
Caspian Art Wave, gallery Resonance, Plovdiv, Bulgaria
Defying Currents, Abschlussausstellung der Weißensee Kunsthochschule Berlin, Prof. Else Gabriel
SURREAL GARDENS between Baku and Berlin, ArtStudio Maria Wirth, Berlin
2017
Aserbaidschan trifft Bulgarien in Berlin, Galerie Berlin Baku, Berlin
Worpswede Price, AUTO / MACHT / MOBILITÄT, PS. Speicher, Einbeck, Deutschland
Granatapfel und Feuerberg, Contemporary Azerbaijani Art, Kunststation Kleinsassen, Hessen
Preisträgerin des Malwettbewerbs, Museum FLUXUS+, Potsdam
Artrium, THE HAUS Berlin Art Bang, Berlin
2016
Aserbaidschan trifft Japan in Berlin, Galerie Berlin Baku, Berlin
Academy of Contemporary Art, Creative Writing with Weißensee Kunsthochschule Berlin, Tromsø, Norway
2012
Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris, France
Grand Tournoi de Chevalerie, Normandie, France
Blue Water, Four Seasons Hotel, Baku, Azerbaijan
2010
United Buddy Bears Show, Berlin, mit Ali Shamsi
2008
1st place of the exhibition on the occasion of the 85th birthday of the President of the Azerbaijan Republic H. Aliyev
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