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contact Zehra at:
zehra.j.khan(at)gmail.comBased in
Lexington, MA.> news
2008 November:
Solo exhibit Memory of Landscape: The Piper Gallery, Cary Memorial Library, 1847 Massachusetts Avenue Lexington, MA 02420.
2008 August:
A winner of the competition "Why Do You Do What You Do?", photographs on display at the Burning Man arts festival.
2008 July:
Painting commisioned for a concert co-headlining The Doobie Brothers and Chicago at the Boston Bank of America Pavilion. Sponsored through Rock & Art, the painting is on display and will be auctioned.
2008 April:
Mural and altar piece completed in New Orleans in collaboration with Adam Scott Miller as part of the rebuilding efforts post-Hurricane Katrina.
2008 March:
Six paintings featured in Fringe Magazine, Issue 14.
2007 November-January 2008:
Exhibit at: Anne Smith Gallery - Follen Unitarian Universalist Church, 755 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington MA 02420.
2007 October - November:
Solo exhibit, Cityscapes: The Piper Gallery, Cary Memorial Library, 1847 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington MA 02420.
Featured in the curator's October portfolio on ArtBistro, an artist's website.
2007 September:
Begin Master in Fine Arts at the Massachusetts College of Art, low-residency painting program (MFAWC). September and May are spent in residency at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Cape Cod, MA. Artist mentors have included Ambreen Butt and James Cambronne.
2006 October:
Artist write-up featured in India New England.
2006 June:
Recipient of 2006 Valence Award for "Raising the Bar" in Visual Arts. Outlet Zine, Lowell, MA.
2006 Jan-June:
Art exhibited and for sale at: Zenaini Gallery #1, 5-C 34th Commercial St. Phase V, D.H.A. Karachi, Pakistan.
Lived in Karachi, Pakistan teaching art and film courses at several institutions including the Pakistani Air Force - Karachi Institute of Economics and Technology.
> artist statement
The colors of candies in a dish, joking with my sister, reading the Karachi newspaper, and dreams are all part of the everyday experiences I try to translate into drawing and painting. Influences from different cultures, and being half American and Pakistani have given me a unique viewpoint; my first sentence was an amalgamation of five different languages.
With the inclusion of text in my art I want to create a piece that is accessible and that you can delve into, and literally read. I don't want you to commit to reading a whole drawing, and in some pieces I have made this impossible, which liberates me to write in a stream-of-consciousness without the pressure of having anyone be able to reconstruct the sentences.
When I was young I was fascinated with the intimate glimpse autobiographies and diaries provide, and I became an avid journal keeper, amateur poet and letter writer. I learned that the best way to remember something is to write it down in black ink, and I have been trying to render memory in this way ever since.
I am turning more often to the spontaneous abstract expressionist marks, a paint environment for words to dance in. I work in multiple mediums, then explore trying to hone my skills and play intuitively. I believe in spontaneity, surprises and spelling errors, which keeps me trying new techniques. Be it drawing on canvas, blowing ink and paint across paper, writing on all of them and on skin and on whatever else will accept the word. Through this process I am looking for my own insight, discovering a sense of wonder in how it all relates to my life and others.
I want to do art as revelation, as absorption of my life. I want to address the fluidity of consciousness. My paint is ahead of my thought. I want to educate myself on the extent of imagination and possibility.
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