Artist Talk

Artist talk at Extra City Kunsthal, Antwerp

With artist Hamed Deqhan and curators Yasaman Tamizkar and Valentina Bianchi

Yasaman: Ten days ago, we had a walkthrough of the installation built in the midst, where Hamed reflected on his practice, references, and materials. Today, we are going to start with a brief introduction and get deeper into some aspects of his practice.

Hamed : Around one year ago, I moved to Belgium from Iran to study at HISK, which was a big change for me. When I first moved here, I started thinking about what might change in my practice. In Iran, I always used an experimental presentation, while here I am training in an academy. I was more focused on certain concepts then—like plant life, human life, and the relationship between human and natural life. I made many different works, but they were usually installations, sculptures, or sculptural installations using diverse methods. It was about improvising with materials and objects. When I arrived here, I started thinking about what I could bring from my previous practice. With that mindset, I made shows considering my past projects.

Yasaman: I remember your work in Iran referencing Wittgenstein and focusing on perception, notions of language, communication, and translation. How are you using those same topics in your work nowadays?

Hamed: I always received the same comment from the audience: "It’s not easy to understand your work because it doesn’t talk about the artworks themselves." I think it’s possible for everyone to think individually and find answers to questions outside of language. To me, artworks are not primarily about language. In my case, though, I think my preference for thinking outside of language is closely related to my background.

Yasaman: I would say that in your present work, questioning perception is more prominent than the topic of language itself. We also discussed in the past that this is a site-specific installation, and the choice of constellation and materials references your previous practice—in particular, three installations you made between 2018 and 2021. If you would like to discuss those projects, we could trace a passage through them to this current work.

Hamed: The installations are Untitled Project (2018), Plant-Place (2019), and The Perfumed Garden (2021). In those previous projects, I would find objects and materials for a specific concept tied to that moment and my feelings at the time. Here, however, since the European context is new to me as an artist, I need to be more present, understand the situation and the people, and find new subjects to speak about. In the past, my solution was to understand how things could be new or different. Only through difference can we continue to live. I also believe that difference exists inside repetition. I tried repeating concepts and forms in a new situation to question how a different idea, concept, or subject could emerge. All of it is present; we cannot isolate each element. This was my method for making this show, but during the process, I realized that all the elements could form a more minimal and abstract expression. Audiences familiar with my previous work will find similarities, while those who are not will perceive it as very different.

Valentina: This idea of repetition is present in how certain concepts and materials repeat between this installation and previous ones, but also within this specific installation—almost like a scaling repetition. Can you go deeper into how you use materials like lime, which is present here as well as in past works? How does its function change?

Hamed: I would like to address why I use lime, rubber, or certain colors. There is a personal story behind it. In my previous works, there were stories connected to this one as well. We always understand timelines through stories—sequences that reveal specific things. Stories themselves are not that important to me, but my use of lime is motivated by a real event: in the U.S., a child was killed, covered in lime and fabric, and thrown into a river to conceal their identity. However, in this case, I brought lime because it held potential as a material for a new experience. Another example is rectangles: in Plant-Place, I used a rectangular shape made of metal, whereas in built in the midst, I used rubber in the same shape. The lime mounds in the current installation replace the live plants I used in Plant-Place.

Why did I do that? In Plant-Place, I was thinking about how we could build a new relationship between nature, metal, soil, and plants. Now, I am thinking about plants, the garden, and William Blake's poem "The Garden of Love." Lime in this context was chosen as a construction material, but also as something used to prevent plants from growing along the edges of buildings and bridges where they might cause a distraction. I replicated the structural position of plants and lime from past projects, but I did not want to connect to the source reality in a straightforward way. I observe a function in the world and make it my own within my art practice.

Yasaman: You mentioned the garden and the repetition of elements. You chose William Blake's poem "The Garden of Love" as an inspiration because its opening describes the poet returning to a place where something used to exist that is no longer there, replaced by something else, like a chapel built where he used to play as a child. Given this notion of replacement and taking over, how do you define it in your work? Was it a source of inspiration for this site-specific installation? Would you say this kind of repetition—bringing or borrowing elements—is a way of replacing or taking over a concept from the past?

Hamed: I think that when we read a poem and repeat it, we learn a lot. But this specifically applies to poetry—it doesn't function the same way with articles or philosophical theses. Poems have the potential to teach new things. A poem is a great tool for understanding something about my show, as is repetition. Coming back to what we were saying about language and going beyond it, I think poems can act as a gateway between worlds—inside and outside of language. Every good poem is not simply about moving from start to finish; you can find specific details about two different worlds within it. I place textual meaning parallel to my work, which holds true for both the audience and myself: I do not know all the meanings of my work. Poetry, to me, is presence and life. You can pay attention to poems or to life and learn a lot about either. But to me, art is not about a single show or a specific moment—making an exhibition, finishing it, and moving on to the next. That is why I like repeating.

Valentina: Is that why you use plants as a metaphor? Because plants evoke the idea of horizontality and a lack of hierarchy among living beings. We normally view humans as existing in a higher position than plants, but your work seems to subvert that hierarchy.

Hamed: In my Plant-Place project, I used plants for that exact reason. Plants are living organisms just as humans are, but they are far more complex. They are not objects; they are a phenomenon of life. Science tends to categorize and quantify aspects of both plants and humans, but what are the true qualities of such phenomena? I know plants, but I cannot fully relate to or understand them; it is like having a conversation without a common language. So my use of plants is not merely a metaphor, but a physical presence.

Valentina: I am fascinated by your use of plants. We often see authors and artists employing the idea of commonality between plants and human experience, sometimes using the term "people" indiscriminately for different organisms. Stefano Mancuso, for example, wrote The Nation of Plants, a constitution written from the perspective of plants that ultimately benefits all organisms and the environment. I think your message is more subtle, but shares a similar spirit. Do you see an expression of a shared brotherhood between humans and plants in your work?

Hamed: I focus more on human relationships and how to build positive ones within different economies and contexts. I prefer referencing the separation and distinction between plants and human relations rather than their similarities. I do not focus on trying to fully comprehend nature. In my work, the relationship between human interaction and plant life remains somewhat vague—we cannot know if plants need us, but we know that humans need each other.

Yasaman: Plants are not physically present in built in the midst as they were in your past works. In your practice, recurring concepts and materials adapt to different contexts; here, plants are far more abstract. For instance, the green in some of the paintings recalls the plants present in previous installations, referencing ideas of platforms, structures, and vegetation through a new approach. It is compelling to observe the evolution of your expression along this path. Having been part of the audience for your works shown in Iran, I always felt they raised more questions than they answered, making a dialogue with you essential.

Another interesting aspect of your practice is the process you go through to gather ideas and conceive site-specific installations. In the printed material accompanying the exhibition, you included William Blake's poem "The Garden of Love," as well as quotes by Walter Benjamin ("Nature produces similarities; one need only think of mimicry.") and Gilles Deleuze ("The repetition of a work of art is like a singularity without concept, and it is not by chance that a poem must be learned by heart."). You also included references to ceremonial and ritualistic practices. Could you explain how you arrived at this concept of composing an installation as a constellation?

Hamed: The reference I used regarding magic systems, witchcraft, and exhibitions as ceremonies was the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, which was active in Europe at the end of the 19th century. They viewed magic as a hidden practice and a new system for human interaction. I constantly question the boundaries between artistic, scientific, magical, or other practices. I think magic used to hold the potential that now resides in artistic practice. We do not have an active discourse around magic today; it is a marginal concept. But in the 19th century, it was treated as an actual methodology. I am drawn to the ceremonial aspect of that tradition. How can art function as a ceremony?

Exhibitions are deeply political settings, controlled by structural systems and tied to bourgeois or capitalist frameworks that demand the author be a "good artist" within their system. As Susan Sontag proposed in her essay "The Aesthetics of Silence," an artist can conceal something in their work if they choose, but only an audience that craves understanding and is willing to search will find it. I do not think magic has an aesthetic in the way art does. What they share is a method—one that remains unknown and secretive in the case of magic.

Yasaman: In magic or ceremonial acts, the aesthetic usually serves a direct purpose; it is functional.

Hamed: Yes. And regarding the distinction between similarity and repetition: art usually functions as a metaphor for reality. If you simply represent a chair as art, that chair will be similar to real objects. But if you repeat something through a physical act, each repetition carries a distinct quality, content, and existence. According to Benjamin, we find widespread repetition and similarity throughout the cosmos, but the human image stands apart. We create artificial images because reality is so difficult to grasp. If we want to understand the cosmos, we can do so only through mimetic perception, not through language. We must identify similarities between two things and construct words from them.

In the artistic process, I may sense a similarity between a specific subject or material, but it is never a "real" or literal similarity; I perceive an intuitive, feeling-based connection before a logical one. How do we access something outside of language through similarity or the mimetic process? Benjamin explores mimesis before and after the adoption of language, noting how everything mimetic is now mediated by language. If you need to express how a feeling connects to a situation, you inevitably have to return to language.

Valentina: Benjamin sees play—particularly children's play—as a mimetic mode of behavior that preceded formal language. You compare your process to how children organize their toys in new configurations during play. In both cases, the same elements are arranged differently according to context and creative needs.

Hamed: Children play with the same toys and invent different scenarios in a similar way, but they lack conscious intention and analytical awareness. They might recognize why a new scenario is novel, but their process is driven by enjoyment and the desire to create. To make art, however, we must give the composition meaning, regardless of how difficult it may be to decipher. We still do not fully understand the original purpose of many ancient artifacts, yet we do not question their artistic nature. It is impossible to fully articulate your internal reasons for making an artwork, but you can find numerous external reasons tied to the modern context and institutional frameworks.