Pakistani American artist Shahzia Sikander is internationally celebrated for bringing Indo-Persian manuscript-painting traditions into dialogue with contemporary art practice. This exhibition tracks the first fifteen years of this artistic journey, from her groundbreaking deconstruction of manuscript painting in Pakistan to the development of a new personal vocabulary at RISD, expanded explorations around identity as a Core fellow at the Glassell School of Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and her global outlook during her first years in New York. During this period, Sikander richly interrogated gender, sexuality, race, class, and history, creating open-ended narratives that have sustained her work as one of the most significant artists working today.
Virtual field trips are available for school, camp, and community groups.
Shahzia Sikander: Extraordinary Realities is organized by the RISD Museum and presented in collaboration with the Morgan Library & Museum.
This exhibition is made possible at the Morgan Library & Museum by lead corporate support from Morgan Stanley.
Additional support is provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art; Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Leon Polsky; Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin M. Rosen; and Sean and Mary Kelly and Sean Kelly Gallery.
This exhibition originated at the RISD Museum with grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Scintilla Foundation, and the Robert Lehman Foundation, Inc. Additional publication support from the Vikram and Geetanjali Kirloskar Visiting Scholar in Painting Endowed Fund at the Rhode Island School of Design and Furthermore: a program of the J. M. Kaplan Fund.
Shahzia Sikander, Hood's Red Rider No. 2, 1997. Vegetable color, dry pigment, watercolor, gold (paint), and tea on wasli paper; 26.1 x 18.3 cm (10 1/4 x 7 3/16 inches). Collection of Susan and Lew Manilow. © Shahzia Sikander. Courtesy: the artist, Sean Kelly, New York and Pilar Corrias, London.