Selma Feriani Gallery is proud to welcome you to ‘Reflection’, the second solo show by Raja Aissa. Raja’s artwork offers the viewer a multifaceted artistic experience, theoretically abundant and aesthetically engaging, humorous and seductive.

Following on from ‘Click’ in 2009, where Aissa’s use of multi-layered canvases and semi-transparent layers brought together the sacred, virtual and the quest for selfidentity, this new exhibition focuses more on the spread of fundamentalism. This examination of the rigid adherence to ancient or fundamental doctrines of religion is presented through a series of portraits, urban landscapes and words written in mirror. “My work draws parallels between the psychological mechanism of who we are, and the contemporary globalised societies conflicted with modernity.” – Raja Aissa, 2013.

The exhibition presents a variety of technical elements and imagery. ‘Volatiles’ depicts urban landscapes burned with holes forming an ornamental pattern. These represent the gap that has formed between the liberal democratic demands of the Arab Spring (the revolutionary wave of nonviolent and violent demonstrations, protests and riots in the Arab world starting in 2010 in the face of state attempts at repressions and Internet censorship), and the Conservative Islamic outcome.

The next series, ‘Scheherazade’, is a display of works where the interplay of obstructed and visible parts, combined with the shadow created by the viewer onto the mirrored area behind the black fabric, portrays the interconnection between society and oneself.

With the ‘Scheherazade’ portraits, Aissa uses Scheherazade (the character who narrates the Arabian Nights) as an allegory for the works. We only see parts of the face. This narrates how the images we have of ourselves are never truly whole in the face of a society that is controlled and overwhelmed by the power of the image.

‘Bespoke’ portrays ideas and concepts that are abstracted, becoming ideas that fit our own personal perception; from there they are transformed into the general beliefs we carry with us every day. The words are ‘written’ in mirror, showing the difficulty to grasp the essence of these ideas since they are caught in the space between ‘I and ‘am’. Aissa comments here that most of our perceptions of the world are filtered through who we think we are, and the mystery of life’s creation. The words are inscribed onto the fabric using a burn tool, symbolising the act of purification. This sense of purification allows one to go deeper, going beyond simplified binary way of thinking.

“My pieces act as a looking glass, inviting us to get past the fear of learning more about our fundamental nature and essence.” – Raja Aissa, 2013

In traditional societies, the ‘I’ or ‘oneself’ is constructed in the chain of family, tribe or spiritual teaching. The virtual world with its horizontal culture of movement, profusion of images and immediacy allows identity to be constructed through the mode of the ‘Eye’. When discussing the works, Raja refers to Socrates, “Connais-toi toi-meme”, (know yourself). With this in mind, it is clear how each of the sections within this series can be attributed to this message.