A Velvet River: L.P.I. on Leila Seyedzadeh
Leila Seyedzadeh, Velvet River, 2025, rope, silk, hand-dyed cloth, Persian rugs, dimensions variable. Photo by author.
Under the Sky, Above the Sea: A solo exhibition by Leila Seyedzadeh, Visual Art Center of New Jersey, Summit NJ
Velvet River, 2025, is a three-dimensional fabric installation by Leila Seyedzadeh of the Alborz Mountain range.
Mountains, which are generally perceived from afar, can be seen and experienced here up close. In the center of the gallery are hand-dyed cotton fabrics of an overall azure color that evoke atmospheric perspective, the breath of distance made visible. Sections of sky blue, with splotches of lavender, indigo and saffron yellow in full-sized, cotton fabrics are drawn upwards in sections, producing unique peaks and valleys.
This exhibition contains a singular installation work in the round: a three-dimensional landscape painting. It reveals color and space through the natural dyeing of cotton—all techniques the artist learned from her mother—using indigo, saffron, pomegranate peels, and safflower.
Seductive milky edges dissolve like memory into mist. Hand-dyed cotton, neon orange rope-lines, and monofilament crisscross the gallery, producing a warpy-wefty mesh upon which the fabric is pulled and hung—structural yes, yet these lines also have a diagrammatic operation resembling the process lines used to measure and articulate objects and space in observational-drawing. The lines crisscrossing the architectural lines of the gallery don’t converge, they move beyond the system of linear perspective.
Leila Seyedzadeh’s color palette evokes the specific history of the Iranian school of Shiraz, (1256-1353) which is known for its lyrical palette and the romantic narratives of Miniature Painting. Leila’s movement through a color palette full of pinks, salmon and mauve is that much more stunning in concert with her representation of the river as deep blue moving into black. This is a direct reference to the current material state of those miniature paintings, where rivers that were originally painted in shimmering silver, have become grey-black through oxidation.
Velvet River is influenced by the power of creative memory to overcome absence; the Alborz Mountains are 7600 miles away. There’s a sensuality and an embrace offered by this exhibition from its multiple atmospheric mountains—the three-dimensional, the two-dimensional shadows, and the small set of mountains made of found and personal textiles. Each has its own unique patterns, including the river in the foreground and the intimate space constructed from Persian rugs. The work flows into a domestic personal space where the velvet river pools at our feet.
The transcendental aspect of viewing a mountain from its foothills recedes when the encounter is reduced to a representational image. Here, however, the transcendental makes an eerie return.
Ernest A. Bryant III, Illuminated Bronze statuette of Queen Karomama. Period of Decline. Louvre Museum, Paris, 2025, Fresco, mono-printing, sgraffito, hair, 24 x 36 x 2 inches
Ernest Arthur Bryant III (L.P.I.) is an artist and professor based in New York, NY. Bryant is deeply informed by his commitment to study, pedagogy, and interdisciplinary material experimentation.
