Institute of Arab and Islamic Art Unveils Powerful Nabil Kanso Retrospective, “Endless Night” – Jing Daily Culture

In a powerful tribute to an artist whose life was dedicated to bearing witness, the Institute of Arab and Islamic Art presents “Endless Night,” the first major institutional solo exhibition of the late Lebanese-American painter Nabil Kanso (1940-2019) in New York. From April 30 to August 25, 2024, this searing retrospective unravels the profound themes of war, suffering and human endurance that defined Kanso’s visceral body of work.

Born in 1940 in war-torn Beirut, Kanso’s artistic vision was indelibly shaped by the Arab-Israeli conflict that overshadowed his youth. After immigrating to the United States amid the social upheavals of the 1960s, his paintings began channeling a universality of anguish, giving form to the collective trauma of violence and oppression around the globe. Rendered on large, unstretched canvases, Kanso’s haunting human figures emerge disfigured and decomposing, capturing raw emotions…