The Brooklyn Museum: Ghada Amer

Set in the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art the “Ghada Amer: Love Has No End” exhibition showcases modernist abstract painting, embroidered sculpture, and the artist’s conceptual work regarding terror. Amer’s work mostly deals with injustice for women and the Arab world. The exhibition consists of fifty pieces of Amer’s art including some collaborative works by Riza Farkhondeh. The exhibition is broken up into the four sections.

The first section is “Patterns and Models” with works like Barbie Loves Ken, Ken Loves Barbie (1995/2002) and Love Has No End. In this section Amer’s motivation was women working domestically. Iconic images of women ironing and cooking decorate various articles of clothing. Amer’s reference to women’s craft parallels her predecessors’ work. Miriam Shapiro, Faith Ringgold, and Judy Chicago all incorporated such symbolism in their work in order to elevate women’s traditional work to fine art. Amer carries on this mission with her pieces while commenting on new issues women face globally.

On the flanking wall is the “Big Drips” section which consists of Amer’s “signature smut-embroidered” paintings. Included under this umbrella is a large-scale painting stitched with pale blue, pink, and yellow thread into the carbon colored background titled The Big Black Kansas City (2006). At first glance the piece appears abstract however a more careful look reveals the duplicated profile of a woman. The stenciled pattern repeats vertically up and down the canvas. Likewise Red Dragon (2000) employs the same embroidered pattern of an erotically posed woman. The orgasmic-faced figure stands out on the paint dripped background.


“The Reign of Terror” section is a commentary on how the Muslim world is perceived as the agents of panic and terror. The Egyptian born artist suggests these perceptions have been pierced into American minds further perpetuating racism and more often then not the American government orchestrated this continued discrimination. Amer counteracts the idea of the Arab world being the “axis of evil” by showing that the majority of Arab people do not fit this terrorist stereotype. The most spellbinding work presented shares the same name as the section. The Reign of Terror is an installation of wallpaper with printed definitions of terror. This concept of terror has become part of the social fabric of our nation and surrounds us much like walls. Many have become so engulfed by panic they have lost touch of what it actually means.

Although many of the pieces in this section focus on words, I ♥ Paris (1991) concentrates on visual stereotypes. The series of photographs depicts veiled women posed in front of Paris’ most beloved tourist sites including the Eiffel Tower. Combining the Iranian cador with the naqqab from Egypt and other countries Amer and her colleagues are completely shrouded by black fabric. Exaggerating the veil references the extent at which a small group of Arab terrorists have been seen as a canopy for all Arab people. The individual has been flattened. The artist adds humor by posing the women in same manner many Americans do when on vacation in Paris. Further proving these women are more similar to us than different.