SHAHZIA SIKANDER (B. 1969)

Shahzia Sikander's work is included in the collections of the MoMA, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Guggenheim Museum and the SF MoMA, among others. She is the recipient of numerous awards and grants including the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Fellowship in 2006. In 1997 she was included in the Whitney Biennial.

Sikander, having studied miniature painting at the National College of Arts in Lahore, beautifully reinvents the classical technique using a variety of mediums. Her meticulous brushwork, coupled with digital manipulation, as seen in Utopia 2, create fantastical juxtapositions that express the collision and synthesis of her dual American-Pakistani identity. Infused with her knowledge of art history, Sikander has successfully re-evaluated a tradition "to the extent that tradition is no longer opposed to modernity." (H. Bhabha, The University of Chicago, 1999)

"I didn't set out with the aim to subvert, let alone reinvent, a tradition, those boundaries became blurred simply through my engagement with miniature painting [...]" (Artist quote, The University of Chicago, 1999, accessed on February 10, 2012, https://www.shahziasikander.com/essay03.html)