Nature's Renewal: Group exhibition

Ronewa Art Projects (Berlin) and O Gallery (Tehran) are excited to announce their second collaborative exhibition, opening on the occasion of Gallery Weekend Berlin. Nature’s Renewal opens on Friday, April 26 at Ronewa Art Projects and features the work of six Tehran-based Iranian artists. Brought together by curator Orkideh Daroodi from O Gallery, each artist offers a unique perspective on nature and the environments that surround us. 

 

The works in this group culminate to reflect not only our relationship to the natural world but how we draw on nature to communicate ideas about social, political, and cultural themes. Several artists utilize nature as their subject to turn the lens toward modes of representation and image making itself. Through an array of techniques – combined with personal experiences, memories, and allegory – the artists communicate our intertwined relationship with nature and to the stories and images we create of it. Daroodi’s curation, of mostly small and intricate drawings, creates an intimate interaction between the works and an opportunity for curiosity, inviting viewers to contemplate their own connections to nature. 

 

Please join us at Ronewa Art Projects on Friday, April 26 from 18:00 to 21:00 to celebrate the opening of Nature’s Renewal.

Featured artists:

 

The works of Iranian-Armenian artist Serminaz Barseghian (b. 1987 Tehran) offer a space for the exploration of spatial representation, where permanency and accuracy give way to the transient and imaginary. Barseghian’s meticulous felt-tip landscape drawings render natural forms in compositions of lines and curves, wireframing the image in the picture space. Barseghian’s approach, influenced by the striped painting technique of her father Seroj Barseghian, draws attention to the paper surface and the artificiality of a representational drawing. Though appearing familiar, her landscapes emphasize the uncertainty of images and the fluidity of reality. Barseghian’s work prompts a reflection of the ever-changing nature of perception.

 

Nature is a recurring theme in Aylar Dastgiri’s (b. 1988 Tehran) work, in which she also navigates between three-dimensional and two-dimensional spaces. The exhibition presents a series of Dastgiri’s digital paintings where objects and environments are depicted through bright, painterly strokes set against entrancing matte-black backgrounds. The resulting spatial illusion references theatrical staging and the relationship between the audience and world they are drawn into. Her work proposes parallels between theater and painting, while skillfully transforming the vivacious energy of the stage to a tranquil stillness in her work. Dastgiri’s vivid still-lifes and landscapes are created from memory, lending them a dream-like quality. 

 

On a parallel artistic journey, Armin Ebrahimi (b. 1984 Tehran) explores the essence and emotional resonance of landscapes through abstract forms and expressive brushstrokes. Upon the ambiguous spaces of his works on paper, Ebrahimi draws ink human and animal figures – sometimes a combination of the two – delving into allegory, myth, and symbolism. His artworks intertwine personal narratives with broader historical references and signs of cultural identities and collective memories. Ebrahimi's scenes seem to exist both outside and deeply rooted within the uncertain time we live in, evoking caution, questions, and desires about our bodies in relation to each other and to our environment. 

 

Raha Khosroshahi’s (b. 1998 Tehran) paintings reflect the dynamic interplay between her body and stimuli from the world around her. From the objects and images she encounters every day to the physical sensation of warmth or cold, her paintings are significantly influenced by her environment. “It's as if painting provides me with a special perception of my own body and surroundings.” One of her endeavors as an artist is to establish an intimacy between an artwork and its viewer. Her fluid, abstracted forms and rich, contrasting colors are an invitation into the artist’s world, one deeply rooted in her instincts, interpretations, and lived experiences.

 

Maryam Mohry’s (b. 1979 Tehran) amusing and enchanting watercolor drawings highlight her passion for nature and gardening. Her work stands out for its narrative quality, fueled by a lighthearted naive sensibility and a sense of sarcasm, infusing her works with a distinct sense of imagination and storytelling. The drawings in this exhibition capture small and intimate moments with nature – the smell of a rose or the prick of its thorn – as well as fantastical and symbolic imagery that points to humanity’s inseparability from it. Mohry maintains her signature playfulness and wit while underscoring her work with a message of environmental advocacy.

 

Razieh Sedighian’s (b. 1986 Tehran) work is the masterful manipulation of dots and lines. With a rollerball pen and using a limited palette of blue and black, she creates organic forms and ambiguous landscapes that transcend time and place. The works presented here could depict microscopic organisms as much as they could geological formations. Her technique is an intricate layering of sketch marks to achieve forms that morph from dense to porous, from stabile to disintegrating. Through this effect, Sedighian subtly alludes to the fragility of our natural world.

 

For Gallery Weekend Berlin, Ronewa Art Projects gallery opening hours will be extended to