Rand Abdul Jabbar Iraq, b. 1990
Rand Abdul Jabbar (b. 1990, Baghdad) borrows from the vestiges and ephemera of history to produce reconstructions of accumulations of past events as they intersect with personal experience. Exploring her relationship to place and landscape while in a state of displacement, Abdul Jabbar contests individual and collective memory while engaging with legacies of archaeology, mythology and material culture through extensive research within archives and museum collections. Employing sculpture, writing, video and installation as primary mediums, herwork unfolds through an experiential dialogue between recollection and re-imagination, inventing a set of anchors that facilitate there-telling and adaptation of the past into a site for the reclamation of agency and affirmation of identity. Abdul Jabbar was awarded the Richard Mille Art Prize by Louvre Abu Dhabi In 2022. She received a Master of Architecture from Columbia University in 2014 where she was awarded the William Kinne Fellows Traveling Prize.
Rand Abdul Jabbar (b. 1990, Baghdad) received a Master of Architecture from Columbia University in 2014 where she was awarded the William Kinne Fellows Traveling Prize.
She borrows from the vestiges and ephemera of history to produce reconstructions of accumulations of past events as they intersect with personal experience. Exploring her relationship to place and landscape while in a state of displacement, Abdul Jabbar contests with individual and collective memory while engaging with legacies of archaeology, mythology and material culture through extensive research within archives and museum collections. Employing sculpture, writing, video and installation as primary mediums, her work unfolds through an experiential dialogue between recollection and re-imagination, inventing a set of anchors that facilitate the re-telling and adaptation of the past into a site for the reclamation of agency and affirmation of identity.
Recent solo presentations include Act II: The Climbing Vine as part of The Rocks Are Singing to the Sky, a performance programme curated by Rose Lejeune for Abu Dhabi Art (2021); Every Act of Recognition Alters What Survives at the Shubbak Festival, London (2021); and Earthly Wonders, Celestial Beings at the Project Space, NYU Abu Dhabi Art Gallery (2019).
Recent group exhibitions include Desert X AlUla, AlUla, Saudi Arabia, 2024; A Permanent Nostalia for Departure, Contemporary Art Center, Cincinnati, 2023; And the Mirrors Are Many, 421, Abu Dhabi (2023); Icon. Iconic: Richard Mille Art Prize, Louvre Abu Dhabi (2022); For the Pheonix to find its form in us. On Restitution, Rehabilitation and Reparation, SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin (2021); Phantom Limb, Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai (2019); This Land’s Unknown, Biennale d’Architecture d’Orleans (2019); and An Instant Before the World, Biennale d’art contemporain de Rabat (2019).
Her work has been published in numerous publications including In Plain Sight: Scenes from Aridly Abundant Landscapes (Kaph Books, 2023), Monumental Shadows (Kaph Books, 2023), Architecture of Culture (Irthi Contemporary Crafts Council, 2023), Architecture of the Territory: Constructing National Narratives in the Arab World (Kaph Books, 2023), Woman Made: Great Women Designers (Phaidon, 2021), Between East and West: A Gulf (Actar Publishers, 2016), and WTD Magazine.
Abdul Jabbar was awarded the Richard Mille Art Prize by Louvre Abu Dhabi in 2022.
