Whitney Biennial 2026

2026

On view
Floors 1, 5, 6

Abstract shapes in varied shades of blue with a few pale pink areas create a structured vertical pattern across a mottled gray background, alternatively seeming to cohere into a row of flowers or a printer’s text, then setting back into decorative geometries that evoke eastern architectural patterns.

Kamrooz Aram: This is Kamrooz Aram. 

Narrator: In making his own work, Aram thinks a lot about the deep history of abstract painting. 

Kamrooz Aram: When we look at Pompeian or Roman painting, which was done directly on the walls, the painting was composed in rectangular segments that divided and organized the space. Painting was essentially used as an architectural device, and architectural painting is often referred to as decorative painting. I think that Islamic geometric pattern, although made with tiles, can be considered in a similar way. It's basically a form of architectural painting, and contrary to the assumption that it's merely decorative, it does have content. 

We can also consider Persian carpets as part of this same history, which is essentially the history of painting that started with pigment on the walls of a cave. At some point, art historians decided that only paintings that were made with oil or egg tempera and often on portable panels were to be considered fine art while painted ceramics, textiles, architectural painting were to be considered decorative, a word that implies a lack of meaning or a lack of content. But centuries of research and formal experimentation went into developing Islamic geometric pattern, various ceramic traditions, calligraphy, carpet design, et cetera. These are essentially forms of abstraction that have a lot in common with modern painting.

Kamrooz Aram, Beneath the Ruins, 2024. Oil, oil crayon, and pencil on linen, 66 × 76 in. (167.6 × 193 cm). Collection of the artist. © Kamrooz Aram. Image courtesy the artist, Alexander Gray Associates, and Green Art Gallery. Photography by Sebastian Bach

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On the Hour

A 30-second online art project:
Frank WANG Yefeng, The Levitating Perils #2

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