Anthony James at the Bassam Freiha Art Foundation, Abu Dhabi
13 November 2024
A selection of sculptures by Opera Gallery represented artist Anthony James are currently on display as part of the Bassam Freiha Art Foundation’s sculpture garden. Here, they are placed in conversation both with the work of fellow sculptor Tarek Elkassouf and with the unique architecture of the foundation’s building, designed by ADD Consultants. The display runs from 14 October 2024 to 16 February 2025.
Both artists’ work display a keen interest in and eye for the manipulation of space, light and form — taking a set of finite materials and, with them, creating a spatiality that feels both timeless and infinite. They also share with the foundation’s building a foregrounding of the materials of industrial production. In using such materials, they challenge and expand traditional definitions of sculpture.
James’ subject is infinite light, his medium is the material of industrial production. This profound tension is just what makes his work interesting. He deals with the worldly and the cosmic, the heavy weight of materiality and the impossible weightlessness of open space. At their core — physically and symbolically — his sculptures communicate the ability of familiar and accessible materials to come together into something limitless.
In the works on display at the Bassam Freiha Art Foundation, we see the intuitive allure of the artist’s painstakingly-developed process. To match their conceptual heft, there is an immediate magnetism that brings the viewer in, physically drawing us towards the work in a moment of communion that goes beyond artistic discernment to a more basic sense of wonder. They recall the words of William Blake, giving them a literal and contemporary physical expression: “To see a World in a Grain of Sand/ And a Heaven in a Wild Flower/ Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand/ And Eternity in an hour.”
Born in England, the artist became interested in the themes of materiality and alchemy during his studies at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in the 1990s. Since then, his work has previously been displayed in public in locations including Singapore, Aspen, London, Dubai and New York. Globally, he has been the subject of a number of solo exhibitions with Opera Gallery including ‘Light’ in 2023 in Dubai, and ‘Divine Infinity’ in 2022 in New York.
