The Fran and Warren Rupp Contemporary Artists Lecture
Shahzia Sikander is widely celebrated for subverting Central and South Asian manuscript painting traditions and launching the art form known today as neo-miniature. Born in Lahore, Pakistan, Sikander earned a BFA in 1991 from the National College of Arts in Lahore. Her breakthrough work, The Scroll (1989–90), received national critical acclaim in Pakistan and brought international recognition to this medium within contemporary art practices in the 1990s. She received an MFA at the Rhode Island School of Design in 1995. Over the subsequent 20 plus years, Sikander’s practice, which has expanded to include paintings, media work, and, most recently, sculpture, has been pivotal in showcasing art of the South Asian diaspora as a contemporary American tradition.
Join Sikander as she discusses her artistic practice as well as recent and ongoing projects, including NOW, an eight-foot bronze female sculpture installed on the roof of the Manhattan Appellate Courthouse; Reckoning, an animation that unfolded across the screens of Times Square every midnight in September 2023; and a survey exhibition of her work organized by the Cincinnati Art Museum and the Cleveland Museum of Art, opening at the Palazzo Soranzo Van Axel in Venice in April 2024.
This lecture is made possible by the Fran and Warren Rupp Contemporary Artist Fund.
All education programs at the Cleveland Museum of Art are underwritten by the CMA Fund for Education. Major annual support is provided by Brenda and Marshall Brown, Mr. and Mrs. Walter E. Fortney, David and Robin Gunning, Dieter and Susan M. Kaesgen, Eva and Rudolf Linnebach, Gail C. and Elliott L. Schlang, Shurtape Technologies, and the Kelvin and Eleanor Smith Foundation. Generous annual support is provided by Gini and Randy Barbato, the M. E. and F. J. Callahan Foundation, Char and Chuck Fowler, the Giant Eagle Foundation, Robin Heiser, the Lloyd D. Hunter Memorial Fund, the late Marta and the late Donald M. Jack Jr., Bill and Joyce Litzler, the Logsdon Family Fund for Education, William J. and Katherine T. O’Neill, Mandi Rickelman, Betty T. and David M. Schneider, the Sally and Larry Sears Fund for Education Endowment, Roy Smith, Paula and Eugene Stevens, the Trilling Family Foundation, and the Womens Council of the Cleveland Museum of Art.