After all the things …, Uman’s solo museum debut, features paintings, drawings, video, and sculpture inspired by transcontinental journeys and a deep reverence for the natural world.
Shaped by memories, dreams, and the energetic pulse of life, Uman’s (b. 1980, Mogadishu, Somalia) approach is intuitive and multivalent—neither exclusively abstract nor purely metaphorical but emerging from the indeterminate and transcendent. Drawing on childhood memories in Somalia and Kenya, diasporic experiences in Europe and the US, and a passion for exuberant color, Islamic art, visionary abstraction, and global fashion, Uman’s imagery recalls the flamboyant textiles of Eastern Africa, the hyperkinetic tapestry of New York City, and the vast countryside of Turkana,Kenya and Upstate New York.
Uman chooses colors for their emotive range and evocative potential. Her paintings all-over compositions flaunt palettes that radiate, imagery that transfigures, and perspectives that perform. Her recurring vocabulary includes spirals, grids, orbs, all-seeing eyes, anatomical organs, and native botany. Working on many pieces simultaneously, Uman builds her compositions with energetic mark making, using dry brushes, her fingers, and palms. Light is a recurring theme, appearing in various guises—from moons and suns to incandescent bulbs and streetlights. This exhibition pays special tribute to Upstate New York where Uman has resided since 2010. Its expansive landscape has been a returning source of creativity.
96 Pages, fully illustrated
Hard cover
Featuring an essay by Amy Smith-Stewart and a poem by Ilka Scobie
ISBN 978-1-941366-79-0
Catalogue Designer: Gretchen Kraus
Production Manager: Caitlin Monachino
Copy Editor: Katie Brennan
Printer: GHP, West Haven, CT
Published by The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum and Gregory R. Miller & Co.
