Artist of the Year: Saira Wasim

After giving it great thought I decided that Lambert Says Art should have a recognized artist of the year. Although many of the featured artists are deserving, one artist's technique, subject matter and final product moved me so much I chose to them high light. May I please have the honor of introducing the Lambert Says Art,  Artist of the Year.

Saira Wasim should be an international wonder of the art world, but this is Chicago folks...Well Lomard. That's even worse- It's the classic story, she went to every single gallery- not even a phone call back-

Finally a New York gallery called her...what is with the Chicago Art scene? It seems deaf, dumb and blind folded.

Her work is the stuff of pop art meets Annals of America volume 4. The fantasy work touches all the hot topics that keep people from going mainstream, but the images are detailed and vibrant enough to be in a nursery. I felt it was a travesty that so little attention was being payed to her work considering the situation in South Asia and the West.

I must admit I have a sensitivity to this type of style, but I feel it is prevalent in a world that has been over run by abstract images for the last several decades.  

This young woman has taken on taboo subjects from Pakinstan and confronted them in a bold and sometimes satirical manner. She mixes her own pigments and  works from a cushion on the floor for about eight hours straight.  Her mother was also an artist and tried to steer her away from this career, but now her whole family supports her.

She graduated from arts college in 1999 and soon began international exhibits.  In 2003 she was included in a ground breaking show at the Whitney Museum for American Art.

Many galleries in had ignored her, but in 2006 Ameringiner and Yohe Fine Art gallery in Manhattan approached her.  Please look her up.

We expect great things from her hear at lambert.

This post was made possible by  the article Quiet Riot, by Victoria Lautman in the Septemberissue of  Chicago Magazine.