Y.Z.Kami, Untitled (The Gardener), 2005, Oil on linen, 82 X 62 inches (208.3 X 157.5 cm). Collection Stanlee Gatti, San Francisco Image credit line: Rob McKeev

National Museum of Contemporary Art - EMST Vas. Georgiou Β’ 17-19 and Rigillis street 11743 Athens Greece (city map, hotel accommodation) Send E-mail tel +30 210 924 21 11-3 www.emst.gr

Curated by: Anna Kafetsi

The National Museum of Contemporary Art organizes for the first time in Greece a retrospective exhibition of the Iranian artist Y.Z. Kami, titled Beyond Silence. The exhibition will be inaugurated on October 22nd, 2009 and last until January 10th, 2010, presenting his large scale paintings created since 1990, which are outstanding in Y.Z.Kami's artistic career.

The works included in the exhibition - paintings, sculpture, drawings, photographs, collages - are shown in two sections. In the first section are presented his large scale frontal portrait paintings. With extreme realism, the artist portrays the deep introspection and spirituality of the people he draws. These portraits, of distant people who are completely focused in their internal world, refer to Fayum portraits, which Kami has studied and has been inspired by.

In the second section are presented mixed media works from the series entitled Endless Prayers, which express the artist's transcultural orientation. The circular arrangements of cut-outs from various Persian, Arabic and Jewish texts and from poems written by the Persian mystic poet Jalaluddin Rumi that compose this series of works, refer to Sufi mysticism, the whirling dervish dance, Muslim architectural elements, byzantine symbols and to the inner, spiritual quest.

Y.Z. Kami was born in Tehran in 1956. He studied philosophy in the University of California, Berkeley (1974-75) and the Sorbonne in Paris (1976-81). His work has been widely shown in solo exhibitions in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, London and he has participated in important international exhibitions, such as the Istanbul Biennale (2005) and the 52nd Venice Biennale (2007). He had also participated in EMST's international exhibition The Grand Promenade (2006), with an installation at the Roman Agora and a painting in Technopolis, Gazi. His works are included in many large scale museums in New York, such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art. He is represented by Gagosian Gallery, New York. He lives and works in New York.