Artists Talk:
Faheem Majeed and Jason Lazarus
in conversation with Michal Raz-Russo

Presented in conjunction with the two gallery exhibitions currently on view, Impression and 202-456-1111, this conversation will explore the ways in which the artists’ practice connects and implicates materials and sites. Further, in what spaces do objects that invoke issues surrounding community, visibility, and resistance have the most agency and impact?
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Faheem Majeed, Impression

For Majeed, “Impression” is an action that he takes as a core part of his practice. It also captures the ephemeral existence of his subject matter. Through the objects he makes, Majeed connects a rooted past to an often precarious present, creating a platform for the discussion of a more imminently possible future.

Faheem Majeed is an artist, educator, curator, and community facilitator. He blends his unique experience as an artist, non-profit administrator, and curator to create works that focus on institutional critique and exhibitions that leverage collaboration to engage his immediate, and the broader community, in meaningful dialogue. Majeed received his BFA from Howard University and his MFA from the University of Illinois at Chicago(UIC). A recipient of the Joan Mitchell Painters and Sculptors Grant (2015) and a Harpo Foundation Awardee(2016), Majeed had his first solo museum exhibition at the MCA Chicago in 2015.
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Jason Lazarus, 202-456-1111

In 202-456-1111, Lazarus presents his largest works to date in a continuing series of unique photograms featuring the white house phone number–the exhibition also celebrates the release of a new publication, 202-456-1111, which surveys the series with an accompanying essay by Martha Rosler. For Lazarus, this project is very personal. On November 25, 2015, Trump publicly mocked New York Times reporter, Serge F. Kovaleski who lives with a rare physical condition, arthrogryposis, the same one that afflicts the artist. With these newest works, Lazarus has shifted the scale up and in doing so has implicated his own body in a more discretely existential act. He uses his entire frame in the dark, arms and legs reaching up and down, to produce each document. The results are a kind of return to self-portraiture amidst a larger political concern, made in a very specific time with the artist himself situated in every mark that is made. Lazarus’ work can be found in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, and the High Museum of Art among many others.
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Michal Raz-Russo is the David C. and Sarajean Ruttenberg Associate Curator of Photography at the Art Institute of Chicago. She is also curator of the biennial Ruttenberg Contemporary Photography Series, which has featured artists such as Leigh Ledare (The Plot, 2017) and Deana Lawson (2015). Among her other exhibitions are Never A Lovely So Real: Photography and Film in Chicago, 1950–80 (2018); Invisible Man: Gordon Parks and Ralph Ellison in Harlem(2016); and Dayanita Singh (2014).

For more information visit andrewrafacz.com

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Tags: Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Artist Talk: Faheem Majeed & Jason Lazarus with Michal Raz-Russo, Chicago, near west side