Anila Quayyum Agha
Shadow of Time

Philbrook Museum of Art
November 10, 2019 – February 16, 2020

Artist Anila Quayyum Agha uses simple elements—light, shadow, space, and pattern—to create communal experiences of beauty and wonder. This exhibition brings together recent sculptural works and drawings, featuring a large-scale installation that fills the gallery and envelops the viewer in illuminated patterns. Inspired by her personal history as a woman and an immigrant, Agha’s work raises questions about gender bias, exclusion, and displacement. She transforms these barriers, traditionally used to separate people, into art that brings them together. Growing up in her native Pakistan, Agha became familiar with the decorative patterns used in Islamic art, and now bases much of her work on them. She combines these patterns with simple, geometric shapes in large-scale installations and works on paper to create thought-provoking art that is both powerful and delicate, minimal and richly decorative.