Artist Database

Known for her monochromatic works on linen and paper, process and materiality are key to Alexandra Karakashian’s practice. Used engine- or sump-oil and salt, are elements that resonate significantly with her conceptual premise. She engages with concepts and materials that are regarded as contentious within the various fragile relationships between humans and land (or environment), and prompts a consideration of the shifting ways in which landscape can be perceived in the context of ongoing social, political and ecological discourses.

Karakashian’s aptitude for authentic engagement with her heritage, as well as her personal context regarding nationality, race and culture, further facilitates her artistic process of enquiry and discussion around broader current issues, in particular migration, identity, refugee-status as well as demographic and geographical divisions– ideas that are at the forefront of discourse around the Euro-African relationship. Her unique background details her grandfather Vache’s escape from the Armenian Genocide of 1915 and his family’s migration south through the African continent, eventually settling in Johannesburg, South Africa. In exploring notions of displacement, fragility and landscape, Karakashian’s choice of medium also emphasises the very aliveness of the materials, as they hang suspended – alive and moving and polluting.