As you may have noticed, last summer’s REEMERGE juried show was also a show about emergence: the revelation and addition of many new talents to our community. From the heart and, at that time in her teaching career, the heartland (namely, K-State and Manhattan, Kansas) arrived ELENA MASROUR, whose insightful, activist, playful, acerbically satiric practice — expressed in comics-influenced art — takes on the scourge of her native land. “My works are inspired by the proliferation of religious propaganda over the last 40 years in my home country, Iran, and the social changes taking place since the Revolution,” says Elena. “I represent a generation of Iranian people who aspire to be modern at a time when religious leaders continue to weaponize the rules of God to maintain control.” Her stunning new collection — this time hailing from Alabama, where she is lecturing at Birmingham-Southern College, after a faculty residency in between at the Cleveland Institute of Art — certainly nods to another sardonic cartoonist in Robert Crumb, while finding a brand-new metaphorical language as the drawings’ heroines do battle with little demons in everyday, often overtly domesticized settings. It’s all part of a life philosophy inseparable from her work. “Painting comical figures lets me imagine the fun of these individuals,” explains the artist, “and it offers my wish for contemporary Iran to become a peaceful, safe place where people can thrive.” All of these original, one-of-a-kind drawings are available for purchase right now in person or online (offthewallgallery.org).
ELENA MASROUR
(in order of the portfolio shown)
“I’m ready, how about you?”
India ink and combo brush on Bristol
11 x 14 framed (9 x 12 drawing)
500.
“Smell a bit of heaven.”
India ink and combo brush on Bristol
11 x 14 framed (9 x 12 drawing)
500.
“I can do more than that!”
India ink and combo brush on Bristol
11 x 14 framed (9 x 12 drawing)
500.
“What are you afraid of?”
India ink and combo brush on Bristol
11 x 14 framed (9 x 12 drawing)
500.