Sanam Khatibi’s works deals with animality, and our primal impulses and the core of her practice interrogates our relationship to power structures, specifically the duality of triumph and failure. The recurrent themes that often feature in her work question our relation to chaos, destruction, excess, loss of control, bestiality, domination and submission. She is also interested in the thin line that exists between fear and desire, and how closely they are interrelated.
Her subjects live on their impulses in alluring, exotic landscapes. They are ambiguous with their relationship to power, violence, sensuality and each other. She plays with ambivalence to juxtapose dualities such as animal versus human, past versus present, and cruelty versus seduction. Wildlife and animals are an integral part of her practice, and her subjects are often depicted within the same plane as the flora and fauna.
Her practice consists of paintings, embroideries, tapestries, sculptures and installations.
Lives and works between Brussels and Paris.
Upcoming
- The Way of the Brush, SMAK, Municipal Museum of Contemporary Art, Ghent, Belgium
Current
- Ma, Group Show, Pedro Cera, Lisbon, Portugal
- Full Disclosure, Selections from the Thomas-Suwall Collection, Plains Art Museum, ND, USA
- Public sculpture project, for the city of Nantes, France
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2024
- We Wait Until Dark, P.P.O.W, New York, USA
2023
- Je serais douce, Le Voyage à Nantes, Nantes, France
2022
- In my dreams, I kill him every night, Mendes Wood DM, São Paulo, Brazil
2021
- Lemon Drizzle , Groeninge Museum, Bruges, Belgium
2020
- Cyanide , rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
- Cruelest of the Seas, Kunsthal Gent, Gent, Belgium
2019
- An Hour Before the Devil Fell, P.P.O.W, New York, USA
- De ta salive qui mord, Musée d’art de la Province de Hainaut, BPS22, Charleroi
- The Murders of the Green River, rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
2018
- Wild Mink, artlead Salon, Brussels, Belgium
2017
- Rivers in your mouth, rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
- With tenderness and longing, Billboard Series: Art in Public Space, Artlead, Gent, Belgium
- No church in the wild, The Cabin LA, Los Angeles CA, USA
2016
- Le jardin décomposé, Super Dakota, Brussels, Belgium
- The hollow in the ferns, NICC, Brussels, Belgium
2015
- Ask me nicely, trampoline, Antwerp, Belgium
2014
- Séduire ou crever de faim, Island, Brussels, Belgium
Selected Group Exhibitions
2024
- Ma, Pedro Cera, Lisbon, Portugal
- Lorenzato in Conversation, Mendes Wood DM, Paris, France
- Full Disclosure, Selections from the Thomas-Suwall Collection, Plains Art Museum, ND, USA
- Giants, Group Show, rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
2023
- Linhas Tortas, Mendes Wood DM, São Paulo, Brazil
- Paper Trails, Mendes Wood DM, Retranchement, The Netherlands
- Modern Love: or Love in the Age of Cold Intimacies, National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece
- Finis Terrae, Geukens & De Vil, Antwerp, Belgium
2022
- Abrasive Paradise, Kunsthal KAdE, Amersfoort, The Netherlands
- The Natural World, Alexander Berggruen, New York, USA
2021
- Modern Love or Love in the Age of Cold Intemacies, Centraal Museum, Utrecht, The Netherlands
- One Way or Another, S.M.A.K, Gent, Brussels
- Paradise , Biennial of Kortrijk, Kortrijk, Belgium
- Beyond the Looking Glass , UTA Artist Space, Los Angeles, USA
- Mirrored Infinities , The Agprognostic Temple, Brussels, Belgium
- Chants of a Gargoyle , Seghers & Pang // Waldburger Wouters , Brussels, Belgium
2020
- The Shameful Kiss, Kunstverein Dresden, Dresden, Germany
- Tears of Eros, Centraal Museum, Utrecht, The Netherlands
- Zonder kunstenaars geen kunst, M HKA, Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium
2019
- The Seventh Continent, 16th Istanbul Biennial, Curated by Nicolas Bourriaud, Istanbul, Turkey
- Some Trees, Nino Mier Gallery, Los Angeles, USA
- Salon de Peinture, M HKA, Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium
2018
- Nightfall, Mendes Wood DM, Brussels, Belgium
- Terres de Femmes, Praz-Delavallade, Paris, France
- Mademoiselle, le Crac, Centre Régional d’Art Contemporaine Occitaine, Sète, France
- Op de grond, tussenin of aan de hemel, Curated by Els Wuyts, Ten Bogaerde, Coxyde, Belgium
- 100 Sculptures, Curated by Todd Von Ammon & Josep Ian Henrikson, Anonymous Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico
- SEED, Group Show, Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York, USA
- Dead Eden, Lyles & King, New York, USA
- What are you staring at?, curated by Domenico De Chirico, Eduardo Secci, Florence, Italy
- Quel amour!?, MAC, Musée d’Art Contemporain, Marseille, France
- NICC 20 Years Jubilee, NICC, Antwerp, Belgium
- Weeping, Dreaming, Fucking, Laughing, Wschód Gallery, Warsaw, Poland
2017
- Hecate, Various Small Fires, Los Angeles, CA, USA
- Dalonaz, Royal, Brussels, Belgium
2016
- Summer in the City, Christine Konig Gallery, Vienna, Austria
- Biennial of Painting, Museum of Deinze, Deinze, Belgium
- Balls & Glory, rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
2015
- Louise 186, Brussels Art Days, Brussels, Belgium
- Me, myself and I, trampoline, Antwerp, Belgium
- Palourdes cuites, Christopher Crescent, Brussels, Belgium