Hossein Valamanesh
Twins
fan palm and acrylic paint
165.0
x 35.0
x 30.0 cm
Price on Application
Provenance:
Estate of Hossein Valamanesh
Exhibitions:
Hossein & Angela Valamanesh – This will also pass, Greenaway Art Gallery, Adelaide, 1-26 August 2007, cat. 1
Hossein & Angela Valamanesh, Turner Galleries, Perth, 17 October – 15 November 2008
Angela & Hossein Valamanesh, Karen Woodbury, Melbourne, 2017
Hossein Valamanesh - Poetic Objects, Annette Larkin Fine Art, Sydney, 23 July - 13 September 2025, cat. 3
Literature:
Ric Spencer, ‘Visual Arts,’ The West Australian, 7 November 2008
Mary Knight and Ian North (eds.), Hossein Valamanesh: Out of nothingness, Wakefield Press, Adelaide, 2011, illus. p.139
Beginning in 2000, Hossein Valamanesh made a number of sculptures using fan palm fronds, preserving the delicate curve of each branch before pulling apart the fibres of the frond leaves into hair-like strands. In Homa (2000; Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide), Valamanesh braided the frond strands in a manner that reminded him of the way his Iranian grandmother wore her hair; the final work pairs the frond with her photograph.
Valamanesh continued to present whole palm fronds, braiding some and leaving others with the strands separated. He returned to the medium again in 2007-08, including this work, Twins (2007). Curator and writer Judith Blackall has written that Twins is "made from a fan palm whose blonde fibres have been braided, like a pair of little girls with plaits. In a surreal touch, each curvaceous palm-stalk finishes with a pair of carved, red-coloured lips – the artist had a playful sense of humour." (Judith Blackall, 'Hossein Valamanesh: Poetic Objects,' Artist Profile, July 2025.)
The palm frond continued to be a versatile material for Valamanesh, as in the later sculpture Mourning (2008), where grief is represented by a loose mass of 'hair' at the end of an upright palm frond. The contrast with the lively, playful quality of Twins is clear, and a testament to Valamanesh's deft handling of the same material to evoke the full range of human emotion and experience.
