"Rayyane Tabet’s works present fleeting moments in time and place, offering alternative perceptions or paradoxical views of political and personal events in an historical timeline presented here within the parameters of sculpture and found objects. Tabet explores the relationship between past and present, memory and reality. Like an archaeologist, he unearths hidden narratives in experiences and materials whose existence and content give rich meaning to his sculptural installations. His creative process often begins with a chance ‘encounter’ from which a story unfolds. For Tabet, stories have layered dimensions that go beyond the purely factual. Often the surreal coincidence of an encounter will set off an exploration of personal memories and the collective experience." (...)
Rayyane Tabet, born 1983, lives and works in Beirut, Lebanon. Drawing from his experience and self-directed research, Tabet explores stories that offer an alternative understanding of major socio-political events through individual narratives. Informed by his training in architecture and sculpture, his work investigates paradoxes in the built environment and its history by way of installations that reconstitute the perception of physical and temporal distance. His most recent and upcoming solo shows include: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2019; Parasol unit, London, 2019; Carré d’Art, Nîmes, Kunstverein, Hamburg, 2017; daadgalerie, Berlin, 2017; Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, Rotterdam, 2017; Museo Marino Marini, Florence, 2016; and TROUW Amsterdam, 2014. His work has featured in Manifesta 12, the 21st Biennale of Sydney, the 15th Istanbul Biennial, the 32nd São Paulo Biennial, the 6th Marrakech Biennale, the 10th and 12th Sharjah Biennial, and the 2nd New Museum Triennial. He is the recipient of the Emerging Artist Award of the Sharjah Biennial, 2011, the Jury Prize of the Future Generation Art Prize, 2012, and the Abraaj Group Art Prize, 2013.
