Ali Banisadr with David Anfam

Ali Banisadr’s densely populated paintings are influenced by the artist’s perception of sound as inextricably linked to color and form. Drawing on childhood experiences of the Iran-Iraq war in his native Tehran (where explosions and other aural disturbances were commonplace) as well as his extant synesthesia, Banisadr works painstakingly and intuitively to build complex compositions that exude a vitality at once turbulent and celebratory. Banisadr has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna and elsewhere. He lives and works in New York City.

Curator David Anfam is Managing Director of Art Exploration Consultancy Ltd, London, and Senior Consulting Curator at the Clyfford Still Museum, Denver. He has been the Luce Visiting Professor in American Art at Brandeis University and was Commissioning Editor for Fine Art at Phaidon Press for almost twenty years. His diverse books include Abstract Expressionism (1990; 2015) and Mark Rothko: The Works on Canvas – Catalogue Raisonné (2019). Since 1990, Anfam has contributed essays to more than seventy exhibition catalogues. His exhibition Abstract Expressionism (Royal Academy of Arts, London, 2016–17) was the largest European survey of its kind ever held. Most recently, Anfam curated Lynda Benglis: In the Realm of the Senses at the Museum of Cycladic Art (NEON, Athens, 2019–20).