Kader Attia and Mandy El-Sayegh on Fragmentation and Repair at Lehmann Maupin

Kader Attia and Mandy El-Sayegh are presenting a joint exhibition titled 'Disfigurations' at Lehmann Maupin in London, running until 4 November 2023. The two artists, who share the same gallery, came together after El-Sayegh admired Attia's work since the 2017 Sharjah Biennial. Their practices converge on themes of injury and repair, fragmentation, and the reassembly of objects. Attia's mirror masks with fractured surfaces disrupt perspectives, while El-Sayegh's paintings and installations use material metaphors to deconstruct reality. The exhibition explores how repair is an endless conversation with injury, creating an alternate physical space that mirrors the virtual fragmentation of the digital world. Both artists collect objects instinctively, focusing on material qualities rather than origins. Attia's series 'Mirrors and Masks' (2013–15) reenacts dialogues with modernist avant-garde artists like Picasso and Braque. El-Sayegh's works, many new and unseen, respond to fractured surfaces through layering and superimposition. The exhibition emphasizes a third experience born from the encounter of their practices, where chaos and repair meet in an endless vibrating aesthetic.