Écoulement No.VIII, 2017

Hong Kong 2017
Écoulement No.VIII

Selma Feriani Gallery

Work on Paper
Ink on paper etching
Unique
75.0 x 57.0 x 3.0 (厘米)
29.5 x 22.4 x 1.2 (吋)
Nicène Kossentini’s series of drawings deals with Arabic texts written by Sufi philosopher and poet Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi (1165-1240). As in her previous works, the artist draws upon an elevated and sometimes impenetrable language in an attempt to suggest a phenomenology of time while reflecting on the disappearance of signs in a fast-paced and changing environment. The series shows different compositions made of a superimposition of four layers of texts sourced from the Epistles of Ibn Arabi. The texts are meticulously copied by the artist in a very small and uninterrupted handwriting that complicates the reading. It becomes illegible as the lines are being entangled. Words flow and lose their meaning, turning into sheer abstract forms.