Piercing brightness

Published on the occasion of his eponymous touring solo exhibition, Piercing Brightness is the first major monograph of British artist Shezad Dawood. For a number of years, Dawood has developed a unique discursive and collaborative approach to making art through a practice that incorporates light sculpture, textile painting and film. Known for his tumbleweeds- ironic sculptural fusions of Islamic and contemporary culture- Dawood gained international acclaim for Feature, a ‘zombie Western’ set in the English countryside. Concentrating on the artist’s engagement with film and particularly his science fiction feature Piercing Brightness, the publication features Illustrations of past exhibitions, projects and individual works, with contributions by film scholar Mark Bartlett, writer and critic Jean Fisher and Michael Stanley, Director, Modern Art Oxford. Contrary to the classic catalogue raisonné structure of artists’ monographs, the publication functions as a meta-text, highlighting recurrent ideas and themes in the artist’s practice.