Gender and art

"You don't want to upset me"- Huda Lutfi 2013.

In “Cut and Paste,” Huda Lutfi presents a psycho-geographic archive of emotions, gestures, figures of speech and images that circulated in public space during Egypt’s transitional period. All new work produced over the past two years, these collages, found objects and sculptures combine to create one impressionistic story of the recent past.

The exhibition’s title refers to the material process of making collages, as well as the archival process of collecting information from the internet. But it also refers to a certain frenetic process of history-making, in which the same events seem to repeat themselves over and over again.

Cut and Paste - Huda Lutfi

Townhouse Factory Space, Cairo

December 1, 2013- January 8, 2014

"After a string of more or less ancient art historical mustaches from our month-long series in honor of male cancer awareness campaign Movember, we decided to start the week off contemporary with this mixed-media sculpture by Cairo artist Huda Lutfi, who melds elements of photography, sculpture, collage and found object installation in her conceptual practice. Titled “Lipstick and Mustache” (2010), the sculptural diptych features two busts cast from her own head, one made masculine with a mustache, the other feminized with bright red lipstick (see below). Both sport sunglasses whose lenses have been replaced with images of soldiers.

Lutfi, who is a professor in the American University in Cairo’s department of Arab and Islamic civilization, often reinterprets and reconfigures imagery from Middle Eastern art history and contemporary Arab politics through a feminist lens. In “Lipstick and Mustache,” she crafts a playful commentary on the nature of gender dynamics and power relations in contemporary Egypt."