Sanam Khatibi

Sanam Khatibi’s works deal with animality, and our primal impulses. The core of her practice interrogates our relationship to power structures, specifically the duality of triumph and failure. The recurrent themes that often feature in her work question our relationship with excess, loss of control, bestiality, the male-female dynamics, domination and submission. She is also interested in the thin line that exists between fear and desire, and how closely they are interrelated. Her subjects live on their impulses in alluring, exotic landscapes. They are ambiguous with their relationship to power, violence, sensuality and each other. Wildlife and animals are an integral part of her practice, and her subjects are often depicted within the same plane as the flora and fauna. Her work consists of paintings, embroideries, tapestries, and sculptures.

She has recently had solo exhibitions at the Groeninge Museum in Bruges, Belgium; Kunsthal Gent, Ghent, Belgium; P.P.O.W, New York, NY USA; BPS22, Charleroi, Belgium; rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium; NICC, Brussels, Belgium; trampoline, Antwerp, Belgium; Island, Brussels, Belgium; and has shown in group exhibitions at Kunstverein Dresden, Dresden, Germany; Centraal Museum, Utrecht, The Netherlands; The 16th Istanbul Biennial, curated by Nicolas Bourriaud, in Istanbul, Turkey; M HKA, Antwerp, Belgium; Mendes Wood, Brussels, Belgium; CRAC Occitanie, Sète, France; MAC, Musée d’Art Contemporain, Marseille, France; Paul Kasmin Gallery; New York, NY USA; Christine König Gallery, Vienna, Austria and Museum of Deinze, Deinze, Belgium.

Her work is included in public collections such as Centraal Museum, Utrecht, The Netherlands; Belfius Art Collection, Belgium; Province du Hainaut, Belgium; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada.