Mutual assurances

Abdul Abdullah is a multi-disciplinary artist whose practice can be seen as an ongoing investigation into narratives of displacement and alienation. A seventh-generation Muslim Australian of Malay/Indonesian and convict/settler Australian hertitage, Abdullah is interested in the tension between projected markers of identity and the reality of lived experience. Working across painting, photography, installation and textiles, Abdullah is sensitive to the political potency of images and iconography. Whether critiquing problematic cultural stereotypes or offering poignant observations about climate change, Abdullah’s work is fearless and insistent.

The photograph ‘Mutual assurances’ is part of an extended seres of wedidng portraits inspired by the 1806 novel Zofloya or The Moor by Charlotte Dacre which alludes to historic xenophobia. In this ornate tableaux, staged in Malaysia, a couple pose for their wedding photograph. They sit in their finery, amid an eruption of flowers. Yet the opulence is interrupted by the balaclavas worn by both bride and groom. Drawing reference to criminality, these masks recast swiftly recast the characters and upend the joyousness of the setting. In this work, the toxicity of prejudice bleeds into a celebration of love and union. Abdullah forces us to contend with the corrosive consequences of xenophobia through subversion.