Family Issues II (2020) & Infection II (2021) by Mohammed Sami
Hayward Gallery Assistant Curator, Thomas Sutton, takes a closer look at this work from our exhibition, Mixing It Up.
Mohammed Sami defines his interest in memory in paradoxical terms. ‘It’s not what you remember’, he reflects, ‘it’s actually what you forget and what you can’t reach.' This fugitive quality finds form in Sami’s paintings, disquieting scenes that appear like fragments, painstakingly excavated from the past.
Sami grew up in Iraq and his practice draws on memories of the chaos that engulfed that country following the US-led invasion in 2003. But the artist does not represent the conflict directly, considering this the preserve of journalism. Rather, his paintings are studies in the texture of memory, set against a backdrop of turmoil and destruction. Sami’s paintings are absent of figures, yet their objects and environments are carriers for human feeling.
In Family Issues II (2020), a chair is jammed against a door, barring entry against an unknown intruder. Silhouetted with black spray paint against the delicate pink interior, the chair looms like a monstrous apparition. The painting’s low viewpoint suggests a memory from childhood, distorted by time and the threat of violence coupled to it.
Infection II (2021) presents a similarly claustrophobic interior with two sparsely painted walls, a patterned carpet and an open door. An image, half-obscured in shadow, shows a figure with his arm upraised recalling Saddam Hussein. In the foreground, a green houseplant throws a shadow, conjuring a giant spider which encroaches through the open door. External events, Sami’s painting implies, enter unbidden into private realms.
Bringing together 31 artists whose paintings challenge us, Mixing It Up is at Hayward Gallery until 12 December.
This essay first appeared in the Mixing It Up: Painting Today exhibition catalogue, which is available to purchase via the Southbank Centre Shop.