Inspired by both the 20th-century funk art movement in the Bay Area and the visual language of the country of her birth, Iraqi-American artist Maryam Yousif merges ancient cultural heritage and contemporary playfulness in vibrant ceramics. Born in Baghdad, she immigrated to the U.S. when she was young and is currently based in San Francisco.
Over the past several years, Yousif has developed her signature Habibti figures, which encapsulate the Arabic endearment for “sweetheart” or “darling,” each adorned with a dress of flowers, landscapes, and other shapes. Many of the works shown here were recently on view in the artist’s solo exhibition at The Pit titled Above Earth, Under The Rays of the Sun, which took its title from a curse tablet uncovered in the Assyrian queens’ tombs in the ancient city of Nimrud.
Few materials are as timeless and versatile as clay, which has been used to make pottery and other objects for thousands of years. Just last year, a 3,000-year-old pottery workshop was unearthed by archaeologists in an Iron Age settlement in Iraq. “Clay, as a medium, has a way of connecting us to the past, and in using it, it opened an interest into historical research,” Yousif tells Colossal. “It’s been so rewarding to study ancient objects, learn how to distill what I’m looking at into new ideas, and create my own world and mythology.”
The artist describes how she’s compelled to follow rabbit holes in her research, from supernatural beings to queens and their gravesites to industry and commerce. She’s particularly interested in the nature of objects as symbolic or representative of places. Having left her first home for an entirely new experience in a different culture, she explores what it means to bring things with us or, indeed, leave them behind.
“Most of the research I’ve delved into takes place in and around Mesopotamia, too, which I’m always curious about since it’s linked to my background and home country of Iraq,” Yousif says. “I feel like working this way keeps me metaphysically connected to a place that I feel essentially far from in many ways.”
Yousif is currently working toward another solo exhibition with Rebecca Camacho Presents in San Francisco, slated for January. A commissioned work titled “Midrib” will also be included in the exhibition Ancient Queenship: Art, Power, and Presence at the Getty Villa starting in February.
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