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Abdus Salaam | INSAAN: RMB Latitudes Art Fair 2024

Past viewing_room
27 April - 26 May 2024
  • Abdus Salaam | INSAAN 2024

    at NIROX Foundation
  • The word انسان (Insaan) translates as human being. The word’s roots are انس (uns), meaning ‘intimate’ or ‘love’, and نسي (nasyia), meaning ‘forgetful’, defining the human being as both the intimate one and the forgetful one. This poetic fragrance is often alluded to by the mystics and scholars of Islam as it so poignantly delivers us to the essence of humanity being that of love, a reality that we often forget within our terrestrial, ethereal and Divine planes.

     

    This body of work, made over the course of six weeks in residence during the month-long fast of Ramadan, ties this land and its hominid remains, this river and its polluted state, notions of our global environmental shortcomings alongside intimate and personal moments. It asks if perhaps love — or the reminder of it, being the essence of our being and therefore our sanctuary across multiple planes — might ease the anxieties, tensions, and personal fears that we project outwardly into the echo chamber of forgetfulness.

     

    This notion is spread across three spaces. Held in the Screening Room, Chapter 1 starts with water, earth, and light, for we are embodied souls who’s transcendence is through our earthly experience and our planet is but a reflection of our communal state. Chapter 2 is in the Covered Space, with tones of the heart and time, where change is most true. And Chapter 3 is in the Residency Studio.

     
  • Chapter One

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  • Chapter Two

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  • Chapter Three

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  •  

    Dream of love’s final flooding

    Drown in place,
    When solitude is touching

    Float upon knowing,

    Where everything turns to nothing

    And all I see is the feeling of your face.

     

    -Abdus Salaam

     

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    • Abdus Salaam Our Last Stone: Fire and Ice, 2024 40 x 40 x 55cm Foraged white quartz from Nirox Foundation at the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa
      Abdus Salaam
      Our Last Stone: Fire and Ice, 2024
      40 x 40 x 55cm
      Foraged white quartz from Nirox Foundation at the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa
    • Abdus Salaam One Drop at a Time, 2024 65 x 75 x 95 cm Foraged white quartz, polluted river water, clean spring water, modified chair, sculpted shale and plants
      Abdus Salaam
      One Drop at a Time, 2024
      65 x 75 x 95 cm
      Foraged white quartz, polluted river water, clean spring water, modified chair, sculpted shale and plants
    • Abdus Salaam Rivers of Gold, 2024 6:08 minute narrative repeating 4K video with original score. Edition of 3
      Abdus Salaam
      Rivers of Gold, 2024
      6:08 minute narrative repeating
      4K video with original score.
      Edition of 3
    • Abdus Salaam And remember the day when we shall roll up the universe like a scroll (21:104), 2024 400 x 800 cm Acrylic ink on cotton canvas
      Abdus Salaam
      And remember the day when we shall roll up the universe like a scroll (21:104), 2024
      400 x 800 cm
      Acrylic ink on cotton canvas
    • Abdus Salaam Surrender, 2024 55 x 30 x 27 cm Foraged white quartz, 24ct gold leaf and sand
      Abdus Salaam
      Surrender, 2024
      55 x 30 x 27 cm

      Foraged white quartz, 24ct gold leaf and sand
    • Abdus Salaam Saajda (Prostration) , 2024 43 x 35 cm Foraged & sculpted white quartz from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, gilded with 24ct gold on a 60 cm diameter mirror on a quartz / silica sand in a 90cm diameter circle.
      Abdus Salaam
      Saajda (Prostration) , 2024
      43 x 35 cm
      Foraged & sculpted white quartz from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, gilded with 24ct gold on a 60 cm diameter mirror on a quartz / silica sand in a 90cm diameter circle.
    • Abdus Salaam Tawakul (Letting Go / Trust), 2024 53 cm x 20 cm Foraged & sculpted white quartz from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, on quartz / silica sand in a 90 cm diameter circle
      Abdus Salaam
      Tawakul (Letting Go / Trust), 2024
      53 cm x 20 cm
      Foraged & sculpted white quartz from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, on quartz / silica sand in a 90 cm diameter circle
    • Abdus Salaam Mother & Child, 2024 30 x 20 cm Foraged & sculpted white quartz from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa. Suspended in 270 gram cotton canvas
      Abdus Salaam
      Mother & Child, 2024
      30 x 20 cm
      Foraged & sculpted white quartz from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa. Suspended in 270 gram cotton canvas
    • Abdus Salaam The Weight, 2024 30 x 12 x 30 cm Foraged & sculpted Dolomite from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, pure platinum and a single five Rand coin, suspended in 270 gram cotton canvas
      Abdus Salaam
      The Weight, 2024
      30 x 12 x 30 cm
      Foraged & sculpted Dolomite from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, pure platinum and a single five Rand coin, suspended in 270 gram cotton canvas
    • Abdus Salaam The Arrowheart, 2024 25 x 15 cm Foraged & sculpted Dolomite from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, pure platinum and platinum slag, suspended in 270 gram cotton canvas
      Abdus Salaam
      The Arrowheart, 2024
      25 x 15 cm
      Foraged & sculpted Dolomite from the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa, pure platinum and platinum slag, suspended in 270 gram cotton canvas
    • Abdus Salaam Two Billion (heartbeats), 2024 450 x 335 cm Acrylic ink on cotton canvas hung on pine rods
      Abdus Salaam
      Two Billion (heartbeats), 2024
      450 x 335 cm
      Acrylic ink on cotton canvas hung on pine rods
  • About Abdus Salaam

    About Abdus Salaam

    Abdus Salaam, born 1989 in Cape Town, South Africa is a cultural fusion of Western, Eastern and African sensibilities. Having formed his earliest memories on a farm, spending time painting and sculpting with natural materials in the mountains of South Africa with his mother, he unexpectedly moved to Los Angeles at age ten where he would spend his formative teen years delving into the arts, extreme sports, and western cultural realities. Since 2010 Abdus Salaam has worked and lived mostly in Cape Town.
     
    Abdus Salaam is a self-taught multi-disciplinary artist inspired by natural beauty, ecology and spirituality. Salaam reveals a sensitivity to three-dimensional spatial expression and the metaphysical connotations inherent in nature, materials, forms and colours. Contemporary in his mystic abstraction, his work is rooted in poetry, calling from a familiar place to a state of peaceful and intensive longing - often using materials to explore the immaterial and always working alone so as to imbue his intention into every fibre of his work. Moving freely between mediums – from sculpture to painting, video, photographic 'light paintings’, poetry, augmented reality, and music – he creates poetic worlds, from the intimate to large-scale installation.
     
     
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