Important Notice

Riyas Komu's art is frequently confrontational, engaging the establishment in protest - both explicit and implicit - against socioeconomic inequity and political violence. By bringing the oppressed and victimized into sharp focus, the artist's oeuvre, including sculpture, installation, video, photography and painting, pushes the contented viewer out of his or her comfort zone.

In the present lot, for example, Komu paints a... Riyas Komu's art is frequently confrontational, engaging the establishment in protest - both explicit and implicit - against socioeconomic inequity and political violence. By bringing the oppressed and victimized into sharp focus, the artist's oeuvre, including sculpture, installation, video, photography and painting, pushes the contented viewer out of his or her comfort zone.

In the present lot, for example, Komu paints a larger-than-life portrait of a young girl, someone the viewer might encounter on a daily basis, but fail to notice. Confronted by this epic portrait, however, there is no escaping the subject and her story. In her eyes, the viewer is exposed to pain peppered with determination; and in her half-open, glossy lips, the artist captures a moment in which she is about to speak - about to narrate her deeply intriguing chronicle. Komu's "...work is often in-your-face, large and seemingly unfettered by practicalities of realisation, akin to theatre. His portraits are often stark, staring at you with frank gazes, like they'd tell you their history, their hopes, their reality, if only you asked. That is what Komu seeks - that the viewers ask, because it only could mean they care" (Bodhi Art website, accessed May 2009).

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