Mala Iqbal
The Edge of an Encounter
October 10 through November 9, 2024
Opening Reception
Wednesday, October 9, from 6–8 pm
Gallery hours:
Thursday–Saturday, 12–6 PM.
Location
53 Stanton Street
New York, NY 10002
608.556.4763
Press Release
JJ MURPHY GALLERY is pleased to present Mala Iqbal’s solo exhibition of recent paintings and drawings, “The Edge of an Encounter,” opening Wednesday, October 9, 2024, from 6–8 PM. The show runs from October 10 through November 9. Gallery hours: Thursday–Saturday, 12–6 PM.
Observation and the quick sketch are central to Iqbal’s artistic practice, which she has continued to develop and refine over the years. She draws while riding the subway or bus, alone in the studio, at home with family and friends, or at any sort of gathering. Indeed, drawing plays a pivotal role in her work, providing the impetus for her paintings. Writing in The Brooklyn Rail, Andrew Paul Woolbright observes, “Iqbal’s figuration closes the gap between artist and subject—where distance, or the lack thereof, is its own substance. It is a relational model of figuration, one that investigates how we are perceived, both to others and ourselves, in community.”
There is a layered and dynamic quality to her largely urban scenes and portraits—transforming glances into rich narrative moments. Iqbal mixes the poetic with the political, the banal with the fantastic. Her depictions frequently involve a chaotic element, an aspect that reflects the urban experience in which “things just overlap, come together—affect each other.” “Protest” (2024) depicts a demonstration. A speaker holds a megaphone in the background, but the viewer’s eyes are drawn to the two larger figures in the foreground, as well as to the crowd, whose attention seems to be scattered in multiple directions. In “Aftershock” (2024), survivors console each other following a catastrophic event—their pain, distress, and grief conveyed through their body language and haunted expressions reminiscent of James Ensor.
Iqbal’s paintings move freely between realism and allegory, the imaginary and deeply felt truths, without relying on any of these aesthetic models for cohesion. The artist is comfortable with human and aesthetic contradictions. Iqbal describes the human condition she’s most compelled to paint: "It’s kind of like swinging a pendulum between love and horror, or something in between that's also a little bit tender." Hers is a radical humanism of the likes of Käthe Kollwitz or the wordsmithing of Zadie Smith—tender, ruthless, loving. She is also not afraid of upending that humanism.
Iqbal draws inspiration from the complexity of her German and Pakistani heritages. Communication that attempts to bridge potentially insurmountable boundaries is important to Iqbal and was something she negotiated throughout her childhood. She also extends this notion to the animal/human hybrids found in her work. “Dogcatcher" (2024) depicts a central dramatic interaction involving a doglike figure with a chain around its neck, while other peripheral figures appear to be uninvolved or distracted. In “Animals" (2024), a human figure in an animal costume threatens a dog as the owner tries to console it. In terms of narrative, Iqbal invites ambiguity in order to engage the viewer more fully. As she explains, “My hope is that people look at my work and kind of wonder, ‘What is the relationship between those two figures?’ Or, ‘What's happening here?’ Or, ‘Why does that man look upset?’ A lot of the time I don't know either. For me, it's also an open-ended story.”
Mala Iqbal has had solo exhibitions at Soloway Gallery, Brooklyn; Ulterior Gallery; PPOW; Bellwether, New York; and Richard Heller, Los Angeles. Her work has also appeared in recent group exhibitions “Christmas in July” at Andrew Rafacz Gallery and NADA, Monya Rowe, and Ryan Lee Gallery. She was awarded a Joan Mitchell Fellowship in 2023 and a New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) fellowship. Her work has been reviewed in The Brooklyn Rail, The New Yorker, The Village Voice, and The New York Times. Iqbal received a BA degree from Columbia University and an MFA in Painting from Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). The artist lives and works in Brooklyn.