ARTIST BIO
Winner of a National Award by the Canada Council of the Arts in 2021, Javid is an interdisciplinary designer, graffiti artist, youth mentor, architect and student of perennial wisdom. With a Bachelor’s Degree in International Relations from the University of British Columbia (2010) and a Masters in Architecture from the University of Toronto (2014), he possesses a unique foundation that combines grassroots activism, traditional knowledge and construction science. As a graffiti art muralist, he has painted and delivered workshops across the world from Medellin, Colombia to Cape Town, South Africa to Mumbai, India. Through his work, Javid hopes to inspire conversations about how traditional teachings can empower disenfranchised communities. His work champions Quadrivium - the four traditional sacred sciences - arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy - through experimentation with new digital fabrication technologies.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Walunt and stainless steel sculpture; 36” x 36” x 18”
Al-ḥaba’a (الحباء) is materia prima (prime matter) believed to be the substance of our vital spirit, according to the ancient tradition of alchemy. This sculpture describes how the inward journey towards material prima - also known as the Primordial Cloud in Islamic cosmology - is reflected in the science of letters - علم الحروف (‘ilm-al-ḥaroof) - which was a tool for understanding the secret actions of the universe in pre-modern Islam. The Cloud is a symbol of the collection of essences that give meaning to every form we experience in the physical world. It is referred to as a cloud because it captures the concept of breath, which is deeply integrated with the root expression and definition of the Divine Name ar-raḥman, the Compassionate. The “ḥ” in this word - expressed as a longer exhale than the english equivalent - holds sacred meaning because it forces the reciter to express this compassionate exhale in the act of its utterance. That deep exhale is the “nafs ar-raḥman” or the “breath of the Compassionate.” This 3D sculpture is an investigation of the metaphysical concept of how the Cloud, or “the breath of the Compassionate”, operates as it unfolds to manifest the physical world in which we live. The artwork attempts to respond to the curatorial theme of “Faith and Spirituality” addressing the age-old question of how to commune with the Divine using artistic means and visualizations.
In one sense, the sculpture expresses the duality of human experience and its sacred relation to the Universe through its composition of material, form and light. The wood and mirror play off the notion of our body and intellect - the opaque and the reflective, the finite and the infinite, the sensible and intelligible. In another sense, the form expresses the duality of our senses versus our imagination - presence vs. void, waking vs. dreaming, the witnessed vs. the unseen. The pursuit of balance between these poles is symbolically found in the penetration of light from the interior of the sculpture, piercing the opacity of the body and illuminating the hidden dimensions of our true form. This light, symbolically referencing nur, can be identified as the illumination of the Primordial Cloud - the materia prima, or essential origin that gives life to material forms.
Moving from form and material to the text and pattern cut out of the wood, the artist maintains an approach to the cosmic unfolding of the universe. The four-fold weaving pattern through the wood expresses the quadrature of the earthly abode, originating from the implicit reality of space and time governed by the two sunsets and the two sunrises (as expressed in Surah Ar-Raḥman, these are the Solstices and Equinoxes). The selected Arabic letters focus on 4 key letters and their corresponding numerical values, as the ABJAD (Arabic alphabet) was once intimately connected to the archetypal forces of numbers (refer to the Ikhwan-as-Safa for more on this cosmological science.
