Adtran, Jurenko, Thurber & Guild Galleries
August 19 – February 11, 2024
Rania Matar, Sarah and Aya, Baalbek, Lebanon, 2019, 19.2 x 24 in. Image courtesy of the artist.
Rania Matar, Nour #2, Beirut, Lebanon, 2017, 28.8 x 36 in. Image courtesy of the artist.
Due to the popularity of the show we have extended the exhibit.
Born and raised in Lebanon, Rania Matar moved to the United States in 1984. She has dedicated her work to exploring issues of personal and collective identity through photographs of female adolescence and adulthood. Matar works both in the United States and the Middle East in an effort to focus on notions of identity and individuality within the context of the underlying universality of these experiences.
SHE features 50 large-scale color images of young women in their 20s—the ages of Matar’s own daughters—leaving the cocoon of home and transitioning into womanhood. In earlier projects, Matar photographed young women in relation to the controlled environment of their bedrooms. Here, she captures them in the larger arena they find themselves in after leaving home—the global and complicated backdrop that now constitutes their lives in transition. Organized by The Museum Box LLC, Boston, MA.
New Date Announced
Lecture and Reception with Rania Matar
Friday, September 29 | 6 – 8 p.m.
Members: $60 | Non-Members: $100
Tickets on sale now
Rania Matar, Mariam, Khiyam Detention Center, Khiyam, Lebanon, 2019, 19.2 x 24 in. Image courtesy of the artist.
Rania Matar, Kayla, Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, 2020, 19.2 x 24 in. Image courtesy of the artist.
Event Lecture Topic:
From the Individual to the Collective: The Photography of Rania Matar
Book Singing: SHE
Rania Matar has dedicated her photographic practice to exploring deeply personal narratives, drawing upon her multifaceted cultural background and cross-cultural experiences as a Lebanese-born American artist and mother. Her work explores issues of individual and collective identity, often through photographs of girls and women in the United States and the Middle East. Working in collaboration with her subjects to create intimate portraits, her work focuses on our shared humanity and emphasizes underlying similarities rather than apparent differences.
Rania Matar was born and raised in Lebanon and moved to the U.S. during the Lebanese Civil War. As a Lebanese-born American artist and mother, her cross-cultural experience and personal narrative inform her photography. Matar was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2018 and a Leica Women Foto Award in 2022. Her work has been widely published and exhibited internationally and is in the permanent collections of museums and private collections worldwide. She has published four books: SHE, L’Enfant-Femme, A Girl and Her Room, and Ordinary Lives.
Thank you, Sponsors!
Presenting Sponsor:
Lead Sponsor:
President’s Circle Sponsors:
Samia Spencer
Artist’s Circle Sponsors:
Donny’s Diamond Gallery
Golnaz and Behrouz Rahmati
Additional Support:
Alabama State Council on the Arts
Huntsville Museum of Art Guild
The Huntsville Museum of Art is grateful to the
Huntsville/Madison County Convention & Visitors Bureau
for their support in promoting this exhibit.
Huntsville.org
