Nadine Faraj

Biography

Nadine Faraj (born in Montréal, 1977) is an artist primarily known for her watercolour paintings.

Artwork

Faraj uses an expressionistic painting style which heightens the social and political tensions that resonate within her work. Her figures are painted in varying degrees of abstraction, with many of her source images deriving from the world of pornography, which often trivializes sex and can be considered dehumanizing. She depicts the deeper psychological states of her figures to express their humanity, political agency, and spiritual dimensions. In 2016, her work tackled political issues when she created portraits of topless female protestors from around the world. In her exhibition Naked Revolt, female figures with text scrawled across their bare chests reading messages such as “égalité,” “with love for female masculinity,” and “still not asking for it,” present a radical vision of female nudity and political power. Art critic Priscilla Frank describes the subjects in her paintings as, "...real-life activists who crusade for the right of women to possess and express their own bodies without being endangered, demeaned, or accused of narcissism or promiscuity." In 2019, Faraj exhibited a series of works dealing with body positivity and LGBTQIA+ representations at Anna Zorina Gallery in New York titled, Get Used To Us, referencing the historic queer slogan, "We're here. We're queer. Get used to us." Art critic Seph Rodney described the shifting quality of the figures in Get Used To Us: "...physical borders are almost always indistinct...Bodies lose themselves in other bodies, melding and morphing in a representation of the act of attempting to forget the self. The sex displayed is straight and queer and undefined. And the borders of gender, therefore, become hazily obscured too..."

Exhibitions

Nadine Faraj’s solo exhibitions include Get Used To Us (2019) and Naked Revolt (2016) at Anna Zorina Gallery, New York, and Miel Salé (Salted Honey) (2013) at Galerie Joyce Yahouda in Montréal. Her solo installation at SPRING/BREAK Art Show (2019) was reviewed in multiple recent publications. Her work was included in the group exhibitions Abortion is Normal in New York (2020), CURRENTS: ABORTION at A.I.R. Gallery in New York (2018), G.R.O.S.S. at Never Apart in Montreal (2017), Radical Love: Female Lust exhibited at the Crypt Gallery in London, England (2017), Three Women at Anna Zorina Gallery in New York (2015), and in Battle of the Masters at Open Gallery, New York (2015).

Faraj made other installations specifically for galleries and festivals including Beacon (Phare) for Articule Gallery’s winter window project in Montreal (2009–2010), Élément for IMAGE IN situ in Quebec City (2010), and in Toronto for Scotiabank's Nuit Blanche (2010). In 2008, Faraj was invited to exhibit her work in the Dubai International Art Symposium, UAE.

External Links and Articles

3D tour of Get Used To Us at Anna Zorina Gallery on Artland.com: https://www.artland.com/exhibitions/get-used-to-us-357375

Marta Bausells, "The female artists taking inspiration from ancient erotic poems," Huck Magazine, February 14, 2017: https://www.huckmag.com/art-and-culture/art-2/radical-love-female-lust-arab-muslim-artists/

Michael Anthony Farley. “NSFW GIF of the Hump Day: Nadine Faraj,” Art F City, October 5, 2016, http://artfcity.com/2016/10/05/nsfw-gif-of-the-hump-day-nadine- faraj/

Michael Anthony Farley. “This Week’s Must-See Art Events: An Overdue Eclipse of Male Artists,” Art F City, October 3, 2016. http://artfcity.com/2016/10/03/this-weeks-must-see-art-events-an-overdue-eclipse-of-male-artists/

Priscilla Frank. “Inspired By Erotic Arabic Poetry, Women Artists Depict Radical Love,” The Huffington Post Canada, Arts and Culture, February 7, 2017. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/arab-erotic-poetry-women-art_us_5894f58de4b0c1284f260615

Priscilla Frank, "Paintings of Feminist Protestors Celebrate The Women Who Bare All To Fight Back," HuffPost, Arts and Culture, October 17, 2016: https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/nadine-faraj-feminist-watercolors_us_57fff4f2e4b0162c043afff2

Seph Rodney, "Bodies Lose Themselves Within Other Bodies in Erotic Watercolors," in Hyperallergic, April 4, 2019: https://hyperallergic.com/492943/nadine-faraj-get-used-to-us-anna-zorina-gallery/?fbclid=IwAR0MsjQwz-8eZCMfU-MbKkRgMil7bj9eH3Qnm4LOWHp1fjLHUmW4vZwFO6s

Jerry Saltz. "Are There Banner Works of Art On Instagram?" Vulture, December 2, 2014. http://www.vulture.com/2014/12/saltz-great-instagram-art.html

Sarah Sharp, "Tool Book." Brooklyn, NY: ToolBooks, 2017, pp. 106–111.

Emily Spicer. "Rip it Up: Paper, Politics and Power," Elephant magazine, March 8, 2018: https://elephant.art/power-on-the-page/

Select Print Publications

Faraj, Nadine. Nadine Faraj: Naked Revolt (New York City: Anna Zorina Gallery Press, 2016).

Faraj, Nadine. “Naked Revolt: artwork by Nadine Faraj,” in A Woman’s Thing Magazine, The Fight Issue, no. 10 (Winter 2016–17). Cover image and images on pages 4–9.

Zevitas, Steven T., Ed. New American Paintings, no. 123 (April/May 2016): 17, 52–55.

References

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