Mehdi Moutashar has been experimenting in geometric abstraction over a remarkable career that spans five decades. Exquisitely controlled, his works are almost scientific in their mathematical precision. Despite this exactitude, however, the artist’s practice equally conveys spontaneous and fleeting moments from his youth, when he witnessed mesmerising ornamentation in local mosques, shadow patterns cast by palm tree fronds, or the lines he playfully drew in the sand. Introspection, for him, is a foundation for rigor, and a means for challenging artistic conventions.
Moutashar’s first solo exhibition in Qatar presents a constellation of new and existing works in a wide variety of mediums, demonstrating how his conceptual approach bridges contemporary art with Arab-Muslim heritage. Insisting on cultural continuity, and perceiving endless potential in Arabic calligraphy and ornamental patterns, Moutashar evades the familiar categories under which his works might be classified, such as Abstraction, Minimalism, or Op-Art. The exhibition reveals his unmatched understanding of the region’s aesthetic traditions, made relevant again thanks to the artist’s original methods.
By overturning the dictates of modernist dogmas, Moutashar’s creations may be regarded as acts of shrewd defiance. They also capture his belief in the inextricable links between the deeply personal and the cosmic truths that govern our lives. Visual and spatial expressions are for him nothing but translations of mental processes cast into tangible form, inviting reflection on the interrelations between everything around us. Moutashar’s works, therefore, are traces of the artist’s incessant inquiry, generously implicating us in his tireless resistance.
