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Lot Essay
Riyas Komu is a multidisciplinary artist who explores media including painting, sculpture, photography and installation. However, it is the genre of large-scale photo-realist portraiture that has long been at the forefront of his practice. Komu uses his monumental canvases as springboards for strident political and social critiques. These portraits, comprised of found images from the media and the artist's surroundings, convey the angst and frustration felt by the common man in areas of social unrest. The artist's soft focus sfumato haunts the viewer, drawing one into the subject's melancholic world.
This painting is part of a series of six works entitled Designated March by a Petro-Angel (Desert March) (Lot 551), all of which were exhibited at the Arsenale during the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007, cementing Komu's status on the international stage.
The central protagonist depicted in the series is the actress Nargess Mamizadeh from the Iranian film 'Circle' directed by Jafar Panahi, a controversial film that critiques the treatment of women in Iran. Unlike many of his paintings that feature impoverished nameless subjects, this painting focuses on a well-known film character, for she "[K] symbolizes the Third World woman, helpless in the face of internal adversaries as well as the greater adversaries of her civilization. I chose her face because of the passions that lie hidden beneath the skin. (K) The face I have chosen is, of course, a mirror on the oppressors delight, physical as well as psychological." (Riyas Komu, Think with the Senses, Feel with the Mind, exhibition catalogue, Venice, 2007, unpaginated)
This painting is part of a series of six works entitled Designated March by a Petro-Angel (Desert March) (Lot 551), all of which were exhibited at the Arsenale during the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007, cementing Komu's status on the international stage.
The central protagonist depicted in the series is the actress Nargess Mamizadeh from the Iranian film 'Circle' directed by Jafar Panahi, a controversial film that critiques the treatment of women in Iran. Unlike many of his paintings that feature impoverished nameless subjects, this painting focuses on a well-known film character, for she "[K] symbolizes the Third World woman, helpless in the face of internal adversaries as well as the greater adversaries of her civilization. I chose her face because of the passions that lie hidden beneath the skin. (K) The face I have chosen is, of course, a mirror on the oppressors delight, physical as well as psychological." (Riyas Komu, Think with the Senses, Feel with the Mind, exhibition catalogue, Venice, 2007, unpaginated)