Jeddah-based multidisciplinary artist Filwa Nazer, an artistic pioneer of the Saudi art scene began her creative journey as a fashion designer and graduated from Istituto Marangoni Milano. Nazer’s intricate work, made using a variety of media, including textiles, collages, digital prints and multimedia installations, explores emotional and psychological identity within various spatial and social contexts, delving into the evolving boundaries between public and private space.
In “The Housed Body,” Nazer presents a new body of work that furthers her ongoing investigation into ideas of transition, alienation and how the body acts within certain spaces. The intricately crafted embroidered works on display, with their muted colors and geometric lines, are fragile, vulnerable and honest. Marking a significant stage of personal transition in the artist’s life, Nazer’s stitched fabric, in the form of sculptural textiles and suspended forms, navigates how the body adapts to certain spaces that contain it, whether sartorially, through a fashion garment or architecturally.
Nazer’s pieces serve as a metaphor for the discomfort of fitting in, displacement, confusion and the changing of roles and spaces, whether those spaces are structures, cities or even countries, prompting the viewer to reflect on their own sense of belonging in a globalized world.
Nazer’s works demonstrate how structures — whether housing or garments — are not secure containers for the body. Her striking visual language of motifs strives to present an alternative rendition of identity or embodiment, which may, now or in the future, rise above the boundaries and containers that limit it.
Nazer’s works have been featured in prominent public collections globally, including the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, UAE; Saudi Ministry of Culture, Riyadh; the Al-Mansouria Foundation, Jeddah; the Jameel Arts Center, Dubai; and the Greenbox Museum of Contemporary Art from Saudi Arabia, Amsterdam, as well as numerous private collections worldwide.
Date: Oct. 10 - Nov. 6
Location: Selma Feriani Gallery, 1 Cromwell Place, South Kensington, London
