Hold Everything Dear

This 10-minute performance piece by Hajra Waheed in collaboration with Clea Minaker translates elements of the artist’s material practice into light and shadow. Set to a dedicated audio recording, an intimate letter from her sister, the work speaks to legacies of colonial violence and acts as both cry and call as it traces back a perpetuating history, while simultaneously projecting forward an undefeated desire for a better future.

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Hajra Waheed’s FIELD MEETING participation is supported by Asia Art Archive in America.

Hajra Waheed, Hold Everything Dear, 2017. Performance documentation FIELD MEETING Take 5: Thinking Project, November 15th at SVA Theatre.

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Hajra Waheed’s multidisciplinary practice ranges from interactive installations to collage, video, sound and sculpture. Prompted by news accounts and extensive research, Waheed uses complex narrative structures to explore issues surrounding covert power, mass surveillance, cultural distortion and the traumas and alienation of displaced subjects via mass migration. Over the last decade, Waheed has participated in exhibitions worldwide, most recently including the 57th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, VIVA ARTE VIVA, Venice (2017); 11th Gwangju Biennale, South Korea (2016); The Cyphers, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK (2016); Still Against the Sky, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2015); L’avenir (Looking Forward), La Biennale de Montréal, Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, QC (2014). She received the prestigious 2014 Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award for outstanding achievement as a Canadian mid-career visual artist and was shortlisted for the 2016 Sobey Art Award, Canada’s preeminent contemporary art prize. Waheed’s works can be found in permanent collections including MOMA, New York; British Museum, London; the National Gallery of                                                    Canada, Ottawa; Burger Collection, Zurich/Hong Kong and Devi Art Foundation, New                                                                                                                                   Delhi. Hajra Waheed (b. 1980, Canada) lives and works in Montréal.

                                                                                                                                                        Hajra Waheed, Artist in Studio (2016), Image Courtesy of the Artist. Photo Credit: Kaveh Nabatian