Breaking free. Contemporary Art Iraq at Cornerhouse.

Daniel Miller previews the first Iraqi exhibition of its kind since the first Gulf War – Contemporary Art Iraq at Cornerhouse

The last big exhibition of contemporary Iraqi art in Britain, Strokes of Genius, opened in London in 2000, before travelling to other cities in the UK and USA. The final stop was in Chicago in 2003. Four days after it closed, on March 16, the war began. Six weeks later, the US President George Bush declared mission accomplished. Abu Gharib followed, civil war, the Surge, and two elections.

In 2000, the main aim was to expose the range and talent of Iraqi artists, both Iraqi-based and diasporic, to a wider international audience. In the event, the exhibition was considerable. The roots of Iraqi civilization are the most ancient in the world. Iraqi artists are aware of this and for a long time, and through different means, from the official art of Ba’athist Realism to the modernist abstractions of the Pioneers group, have managed to express it.

But that was then. The new brief, arriving in the aftermath of war and the concomitant rearrangement of the map (and especially, the northern map), is one of new positions and new liberations. According to ArtRole, the main outfit behind the Contemporary Art Iraq exhibition at Cornerhouse, the show provides ‘a platform for a new generation of artists who acknowledge the aesthetics of conflict, but are not bound by them’.

Nineteen artists feature, all Iraqi-based, many under thirty, none widely known. This makes the show exciting, but ultimately hard to preview. Formally, the exhibition splits-off into three main themes (The Changing City, Of Time and Tradition, Protest…) and incorporates installation, video, photography, performance, painting, as well as a symposium that showcases various raving speakers.

One thing that can be said for certain is that this is not a comprehensive survey of contemporary Iraqi art, but something else. None of the ‘Phoenix Group’, the Iraqi painters that the Pomegranate Gallery in SoHo have been importing into the US market (after initially inventing), feature. Wafaa Bilal, a contemporary US-Iraqi artist known for his May 2007 Domestic Tension, which invited webcam users to machine-gun him with paintballs over thirty days, is another noted absentee. In fact, the sole continuity between this show and Strokes of Genius is the Hull-based artist and musician Adalet R. Garmiany, who showed work ten years ago and today is ArtRole’s Executive Director. It is always possible to play the sadly-absent game with art shows, and never more so here: last week, the UK Border Agency denied five artists travel visas to attend their own show, for failing to supply bank statements.

‘Contemporary Iraqi art in the aftermath of the US-led invasion has taken on various roles, be that of resistance, documentation, testimony, prediction and hope,’ says Nada Shabout, Assistant Professor of Art History at the University of North Texas, but in the last few years the role of art appears to have veered towards third-level diplomacy. This is a developing trend in global contemporary art, especially with respect to conflict zones, since it allows more flexibility and involves less risk than traditional art-cultural treasure loans of recognized masterpieces.

ArtRole has so far been the major player in the UK/Iraqi relationship. In 2009, the organization staged a three-day arts festival in the former Red Jail in Sulaymaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan, incorporating Richard Wilson’s oil installation, 20:50. In 2011, an even more ambitious programme – an annual festival called Mesopotamian Arts – is set to open in the same region. These developments are positive, and what we want to hear. A jail becomes an art space. Optimistic, democratic, independent, newly-confident Iraq is moving-on, and once again exporting culture.

But how realistic is this picture? There is always a danger within art in confusing the map for the territory. Last month’s Iraqi elections remain hotly contested. On Sunday, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s State of Law party alleged electoral manipulation to the tune of 750,000 votes, exacerbating a political deadlock that has no solution in sight. Over the last few weeks, executions and car bombs have returned to the streets of Baghdad.

There is even a danger of confusing one part of the country for another. ArtRole, like other European cultural institutions, operates in Erbil, in autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan, the major political winner of the 2003 invasion. The area is stable and peaceful; removed from the maelstrom. Official coalition casualty figures in the region since the 2003 invasion remain at zero. Fifteen of the nineteen exhibiting artists featured in Contemporary Art Iraq are Iraqi Kurds. This fact alone suggests the exhibition in Manchester might be misnamed.

But ultimately this show will stand or fall on its creative merits. Artists are not witness reporters, and the best transcend their backgrounds. Contemporary Art Iraq won’t supply a comprehensive picture of contemporary Iraq. But the perspectives that it presents will almost certainly be fresh.

Contemporary Art Iraq opens on Friday 16 April (until 20 June 2010) at Cornerhouse. Free entry. Daniel Miller is a writer based in Tel Aviv. Images (top to bottom): Julie Adnan, Born in Jail (2009); Jamal Penjweny, Iraq is Flying (2006 – 2009).

Possibly related to this:

1. The summer’s not over yet – contemporary art at Castlefield. Kevin Bourke discovers the difference between commission and concession, and finds a survival strategy with sweets and tea, all at...
2. Impractical proposal. Unrealised Potential opens at Cornerhouse. Matt Hull finds a gallery humming with potential ...
3. Contemporary Art Iraq The Turner Prize nominated sculptor Richard Wilson talks exclusively to the co-curators of Cornerhouse's latest art exhibition, Contemporary Art Iraq:...
4. Opening this week: art April in Manchester Spring has clearly sprung in Manchester – and we’re not just on about the daffodils and buds a-blooming but the...
5. Crisis theory. Contemporary art at Castlefield. Kate Feld finds a brave new world at Manchester's Castlefield Gallery...