JASON SEIFE INTERVIEW
Full Jason Seife Interview on our Youtube Channel here
Jason Seife is a artist in Miami known for his paintings that appropriate Persian rugs. His love for symmetry, pattern and ornamentation come together in a perfect storm through his art, paying respect to his heritage and care for keep the traditions alive of countries he’s been influenced by. We hung out with him in his Miami studio for the day following him along for the process of obscuring parts of his works via screen printing at IS projects.
JASON SEIFE INTERViEW
Quiet Mouth, Loud Hands
The artist Jason Seife foreshadows the aftermath of a society that fails to uphold cultural expression. In a new body of paintings, three-dimensional objects and an immersive visual landscape, Seife reimagines historic design motifs and maps out kaleidoscopic worlds. Decorative elements of each series fade in and out of view, either through direct obfuscation or
gradual deterioration. The exhibition’s title signals that there is hope yet. Quiet Mouth, Loud Hands, underscores the notion that in extremely repressive circumstances, actions can be a catalyst for change.
Seife examines the lasting repercussions of economic embargoes and its consequent stifling of development through a series of richly detailed oil and acrylic paintings. Echoing the act of censorship that is often coupled with political isolation, he deliberately obscured broad swathes of his compositions. Seife scanned antique maps of the Middle East and Cuba and recomposed them deliberately–removing borders and spatial delineations–to create nebulous forms that were then silk-screened on discrete areas of his hand finished paintings. Over forty layers of muted and pastel tones completed the shrouding effect. The paintings hang on immersive walls that are papered in the same abstract patterning, outlined only by their wooden frames. The visitor is situated in an atmosphere of the artist’s making, where the forms reverberate past the constraints of the canvases and consume the gallery.
In an experimental series of sculptural vases, their ornamentation represents creativity. Inspired by the form of the ‘Cavour’ vase, an exemplary glass vessel from the Mamluk era (1250 to 1517) in regional Syria and Egypt. Each set of triptychs begins with a vase fully wrapped in floral adornment, which gradually peels away and leaves behind a bare surface. This act of stripping mirrors an erasure of cultural expression. However, Seife argues that it is impossible to fully eradicate the desire to create; as evidenced by the resilient decorative motif that continues to grow outwards.
The capstone of the exhibition, Found in the Flood, 2024, melds the past and the present, recalling an excavated, ancient artifact. It is the singular concrete work, which juxtaposes the artist’s delicate painterly touch with a porous and textural base. Seife built the slab: mixing and curing the concrete to alchemize the material into his desired surface. In this instance, he created indentations in the concrete, which were then stained. The resulting effect elicits deteriorating walls or weathered mosaics that carry and fossilize the traces of history. This painting is Seife’s warning to society that through collective suppression, there is an inevitable possibility of ruin.
Text by Audrée Anid
