Rana Begum’s new Louvre series explores how different materials interact with light and considers texture, density, reflection and transparency. Uniform panels of glass, stone and metal are tilted and repeated to create suspended and wall-based works. There is a familiarity to these compositions, observed throughout our urban landscapes in ventilation panels, façades and blinds. The functional geometry enables a process of filtration, controlling how air or light passes through a partition. By focusing on materiality, Begum brings this notion to the foreground, exploring how light is filtered, dispersed, fragmented, or absorbed.

Begum’s second solo exhibition at the gallery demonstrates a move towards a more meditative practice that seeks to distil and simplify, creating a space for contemplation. Colour and material are brought into focus and explored with restraint and deliberation, considering the intangible effect these elements have on a space and our relationship to it. The lightness of glass is accentuated through the application of gradated colour, creating vibrant, solid planes that soften into transparency. Glowing against the wall, the pigment appears to gently evaporate. The weight of stone contrasts with this immateriality, offering a sense of solidity and grounding.

In the new Relief Panel series, Begum revisits ideas developed early in her career. Referencing façade and moulding motifs, Relief Panels in stone and painted aluminium explore angular form with horizontal and vertical emphasis. Alongside these works are a series of watercolours created during a residency. An essential travel companion, Begum’s watercolours respond to architecture, space and light, capturing the rhythm of her environment as the medium resists rigid boundaries. The immediacy of these paper studies demonstrates the continuous process of observation that informs the accompanying sculptural works. This practice of observation, translation and distillation runs throughout the show, connecting different strands in an ongoing narrative that seeks to capture an experience that remains, as yet, undefined.

Rana Begum was born in 1977 in Bangladesh. She lives and works in London. Recent solo exhibitions include Ordered Form at St Albans Museum + Gallery, UK (2023 –24); Dappled Light at Mead Gallery, UK (2021), Pitzhanger Manor, UK (2022), Concrete at Alserkal Avenue, Dubai, UAE (2023), The Box, Plymouth, UK (2023); Infinite Geometry, Wanås Konst, Sweden (2021); A Conversation with Light and Form, Tate St Ives, Cornwall, UK (2018); Space, Light, Colour, Djanogly Gallery, Nottingham, UK (2018), Sainsbury Centre, Norwich, UK (2017) and The Space Between, Parasol Unit, London, UK (2016). In 2017 Begum curated Occasional Geometries at Yorkshire Sculpture Park featuring works from the Arts Council Collection. Begum's work has been included in group exhibitions at The Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK (2023); Desert X, Palm Springs, USA (2023); Dhaka Art Summit, Shilpakala Academy, Dhaka, Bangladesh (2023); Creative Folkestone Triennial, Kent, UK (2021); Gemeente Museum, Den Haag, The Netherlands (2016); Kettles Yard, Cambridge, UK (2018) and The 11th Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, Korea (2016). A comprehensive monograph, Rana Begum: Space Light Colour, was published by Lund Humphries in 2021. Begum was elected a Royal Academician in 2020.

Opening Hours

Tue-Sat 11am-5pm

Location:

27 Old Nichol Street
London, E2 7HR

Text and pictures, copyright Kate Macgarry and the artist