Yamini Nayar

Drawing inspiration from cinema, photographic archives and mass media, Yamini Nayar builds imagined interiors from found and discarded materials, and she photographs them before destroying the tableaux. The environments that Nayar constructs loosely reference both specific landmarks, such as Frank Lloyd Wright’s Johnson Wax Building and generic spaces like a midcentury living room. They are absent of people and appear psychologically loaded, often with distorted perspectives that may disorient viewers. Nayar describes her works as “spaces that question the iconic in photographic memory, where found images are pivot points for imagined, alternate structures.”

Nayar’s work is included in numerous public and private collections, including the Guggenheim Museum, Saatchi Gallery, Queensland Art Gallery, deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Cincinnati Art Museum, Queens Museum and United States Arts in Embassies. Her work has been featured in publications including The New York Times, The New Yorker, Artforum, Art in America and Frieze. Nayar is the recipient of a 2014 Art Matters grant and currently serves as thesis adviser in the School of Visual Arts Graduate Photography Department

Courtesy of Gallery Wendi Norris