Am i human yet?

Nadia Waheed

New York May 27, 2021

“(Am I human yet?) I’ve been telling everyone, “this is a time of great transformation.” It hurts. There is a certain liquidation of my former self happening. A shirking-off. An elimination of what I could not digest. This work is special, very special. Personal, secret, sacred. I’m showing you my insides, not out of vulnerability, but out of anger. I’m angry. I’m angry at You. After years of holding this voice choked inside my throat, I say to You, who looks at me with eyes slitted with hate and disgust, who revels in grinding me to oblivion, I say, “You who does not believe my humanity, You who refuses to look, You who flattened me into a body, into an object, flattened me into nothing - see my blood, look at the raw nerves, friable skin. Is this what I have to show you to be human? Is this what I have to show you to deserve acknowledgement? Do you need to see my bone and sinew for me to be a person? For me to be sentient, thinking, feeling? And now that I’ve showed you, torn the skin, opened the veins, shown my insides, shown that I am Alive, breathing, heart beating, will you believe me? Am i human to you now?”

I’m not sad anymore. I’m not going to cry about this alone. I’m going to be angry. I’m going to be angry at You. I will use my voice. You will not be able to misunderstand me, I will make myself very clear: I will never allow You to hurt me again.”

-Nadia Waheed

Statement

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Les œuvres

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Characters

“Grief and confusion and this feeling of vertigo, how everything just feels different. Like the world is the same but, everything is just so so so different. And I’m allowing myself to flesh out these different things and see how they interact with each other.”

- Nadia Waheed

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Arsenal Contemporary Art New York is pleased to present Nadia Waheed’s solo project, Am I Human Yet? Featuring a suite of new paintings on paper, the exhibition negotiates the personal and political in a timely and poignant manner. Whilst Waheed’s practice is inherently autobiographical, Am I HumanYet? reflects upon our current moment of readdressing social and racial justice from a position of emotional condemnation.

Waheed’s previous work focused more on exploring a specific feeling or moment in time, often from a perspective of reconciling cultural trauma. This new body of work is more concerned with catharsis and grief, which is particularly evident in the Exposure Therapy series. Feelings and processes interact with each other to form intricate narrative constructs that resonate profoundly with the artist.

Waheed has been drawing skeletons and the visceral interior of bodies since she was a child but her recent work is questioning the genesis of these images and their significance with a greater intensity. The characters such as Transfiguration, Lucidity, and The Universe explore the sensation of misalignment or what the artist refers to as vertigo. 

The work is a persistent struggle against internal and external adversity in order to progress and generate self-knowledge. Amidst a transitory social upheaval, Waheed’s images of the female body dispel pain and anger but they also simultaneously demand uncompromised benevolence. Am I Human Yet? represents the determination of agency within a volatile and troubled environment.

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