British artist, filmmaker (born 1964)
Alia Syed (born 1964) is an experimental filmmaker and artist of Welsh-Indian descent.
Biography.
Born in Swansea, Wales, Syed earned her Bachelors in Fine Arts from the University of East London in 1987 and a Postgraduate degree in Mixed Media from the Slade School of Fine Art in 1992. She has taught and lectured at Central St. Martins and the Chelsea College of Art and Design, and she is now an associate lecturer at Southampton Solent University. Syed’s work has been screened and exhibited in museums, galleries, and festivals worldwide, including at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid, Institute of International Visual Arts (inIVA) in London, and the Talwar Gallery, which has represented her for over a decade, in New York City and in New Delhi. Syed lives and works in London, UK.
Syed’s work focuses on issues of identity, representation, and language, often incorporating sound and text, in addition to images and characters, to explore and question structures of personal and collective narrative. Syed has said, “I am interested in language; we construct ourselves through language; it creates the space where we define ourselves. Film can be a mirror—it can throw things back at us in a way that makes us question the ideas we have about ourselves and through this each other…I [am] interested in what happens when you hold more than one ‘culture’ within you at any given time.”
 Talwar Gallery, "Elision", New Delhi, India
 Talwar Gallery, New York, NY, US
 (February --March) The New Art Gallery Walsall, UK
 (February --March) The Space Gallery at InIVA, London, UK
 (June --August) Turnpike Gallery, Manchester, UK
 (June --September) Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow, Scotland
 Lahore Biennale 01, Lahore, Pakistan
 Solyanka State Gallery, "PARAJANOV", Moscow, Russia
 Arts Depot, "1001100111001", London, UK
 Talwar Gallery, "(desi)re", New York, NY, US
Film works.
2019: "Meta Incognita: Missive II"
2016: "On a wing and a prayer" (text by David Herd)
2010–2013: "Panopticon Letters: Missive I"
2008–2011: "Priya"
2006–2011: "A Story Told"
2010: "Wallpaper"
2005: "LA Diary"
2003: "Eating Grass"
2001: "Spoken Diary"
1994: "The Watershed"
1991: "Fatima's Letter"
1989: "Three Paces", "Swan"
1987: "Unfolding"
1985: "Durga"
Selected honors, lectures and screenings.
2010- Tate Britain, "Conversation Pieces", London, UK
2005- Los Angeles County Museum of Arts (LACMA), "Eating Grass", Los Angeles, CA
2000- Tate Modern, "Watershed" in Performing Bodies, London, UK
1997- Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), "Fatima's Letter," London, UK
1996- Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), "Watershed" in Pandemonium, London, UK
1994- Ikon Gallery, "Fatima's Letter" in Beyond Destination, Birmingham, UK
1991- Tate Gallery, "Fatima's Letter" in 25 years of British Avant Garde, London, UK
References.
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