Kamyar Bineshtarigh
Amal Rakibi Gallery
Language, communication, migration, and displacement are notions and issues that artist Kamyar Bineshtarigh looks into through his art. Born in Semnan, Iran, the multidisciplinary artist is based in Cape Town, graduating from Cape Town Creative Academy with a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in contemporary art in 2024 and a Diploma in Fine Art from Ruth Prowse School of Art in Cape Town in 2019. He received the Ruth Prowse Award for his series An Exhaustive Catalogue of Texts Dealing with the Orient. For his 2021 graduate exhibition at the University of Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art, he was awarded the Simon Gerson Prize and in that same year given a Creative Knowledge Resources Fellowship from the National Research Foundation and UCT.
Calligraphy, Arabic script, Farsi script, text sit at the centre of the artist's work; with the artist's experience of moving from Iran to South Africa informing his work. An aesthetic of form and shape, layered paint exploring mark-making and any complexities that arise from translated text. Questioning linguistics and communication through his works of art made in ink, pencil, shards of glass, glue, or layers of paint extracted from the very walls of his studio.
Large monumental canvases of calligraphy made with ink, bleach, cold glue, imposing, torn or as a fracture, spiritual and commanding, on display at Menart Fair 2026 in Paris with Amal Rakibi Gallery . To the fair's question Where is Home? The artworks showcase the artist's perspective of understanding, communication and movement; conveying in response to look at a feeling.
Pictures:
Kamyar Bineshtarigh, Untitled (Ghazal), 2020, Ink on canvas, 175 x 135 cm. Amal Rakibi Gallery. Picture courtesy of Menart Fair
Kamyar Bineshtarigh, Untitled (Book Of Tawhid XI), 2021, Ink, bleach on canvas, 205 x 235 cm. Amal Rakibi Gallery. Picture courtesy of Menart Fair
Kamyar Bineshtarigh, Untitled, Gairodien's Student Notebook VII), 2021, Ink, bleach, cold glue on canvas, 220 x 176 cm. Amal Rakibi Gallery. Picture courtesy of Menart Fair