DANA AWARTANI (SAUDI ARABIAN, B. 1987)

Conceived in 2016, Icosahedron within a Dodecahedron is one of the seminal works from Dana Awartani’s iconic Platon Solid Duals series created between 2016 and 2018. Informed by the inherent beauty of platonic solids, considered to be the only mathematically ‘perfect’ shapes in three-dimensional space that derive from a sphere, the series examines the dual nature that these shapes embody. Each platonic solid has a polar reciprocation or a ‘reverse’ pair that fits within the complementary solid in geometric harmony. The indivisible duality between the Icosahedron and the Dodecahedron highlights other dichotomies that Awartani explores through her practice. The inseparable connection between the timeless relevance of Middle Eastern and Islamic traditional crafts and the transforming contemporary awareness is explored through the choice of medium. The delicacy of the glass, the rigidity of the copper framing, and the beautifully tessellated wooden nucleus - nourished, as she describes, by the five Plato’s classical elements (earth, air, fire, water, aether) - co-exist within a single complete structure. She articulates this inextricable connection between mathematics and the living world: ‘You can see geometry throughout nature at every level from the macro to microcosmic’ (D. Awartani, quoted in K. Monks, ‘Dana Awartani and the universal language of sacred geometry’, in CNN Style, 19 December 2016). Highlighted in the show Not New Now/Quoi de neuf là at the Marrakech Biennale 6 in 2016, Icosahedron within a Dodecahedron is a timeless and universal piece with an extraordinary philosophical and cosmological underpinning.

Recipient of the prestigious National Cultural Award conferred by the Ministry of Culture of Saudi Arabia in 2021, and currently chosen as a representing artist for the 2023 Sharjah Biennial, Awartani is one of the most acclaimed artists challenging the border between traditions and contemporaneity. In 2020, she was appointed an artist residency at NTU Center for Contemporary Art Singapore and at the prestigious Delfina Foundation in London in 2015. She counts an extensive number of solo shows, including Detroit Affinities: Dana Awartani at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit in 2017, featuring works from the same Platon Solid Duals series. She has participated in numerous group exhibitions in respected international museums, including Louvre, Abu Dhabi; C3A Centro de Creación Contemporánea de Andalucía; The British Museum, London; Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid; The Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC; Pera Museum, Istanbul; Monash University of Art, Melbourne; The Mosaic Rooms, London and Institute of Arab and Islamic Art, New York. Awartani continues to live and work in her native city Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.