Henna Nadeem

Born, 1966 in Leeds

Henna Nadeem was born in Leeds in 1966. She graduated with an MA from the Royal College of Art, London in 1993. She was one of the exhibitors in Landscape Trauma. For the exhibition, she contributed a visually fascinating set of montaged photographs, which questioned and re-presented archetypal depictions of the countryside. Gallery notes offered the view that “Whilst the bottom image remains intact, the [overlaid] top image is cut away using the artist’s own customised Islamic or William Morris pattern as a template. These images, which are slightly askew, suggest movement or a shifting viewpoint, and appear to be in a state of metamorphosis, promising but never actually coalescing into a coherent whole.’ In effect, what we see within this work of Nadeem’s, is not one picture, but two. For within the overlaid geometric shapes there lie parallel pictures which, whilst heavily referencing the background pictures, simultaneously have a visual integrity of their own.

These are in some ways not easy pictures to look at, as they demand much from our eyes. And whilst the William Morris latticework presents itself as a largely decorative affair, some of Nadeem’s pieces suggest/present a fascinating interplay between different types of landscape and attendant associations of territory.

»  Alien Nation

Catalogue relating to an exhibition, 2006