Lin May Saeed

"German artist Lin May Saeed (b. 1973) grapples with the complex entanglements of humans and animals. Her work centers on the nonhuman animal and revisits, revises, or outright invents stories of animal subjugation, liberation, and harmonious cohabitation with humans, combining historical, mythical, and theological narratives with materials such as paper, steel, and Styrofoam. This latter material-easy to acquire and work, yet environmentally violent-receives particularly sustained attention. Empathy, humor, and lightness of touch combine with a radical reimagining of everyday life and a sense of how animality is intertwined with otherness. The catalogue surveys Saeed's formation, work, and thinking, positioning them within a broader discourse on animals and animality in art and culture. Its title suggests the appearance of animals in humans' modern moral consciousness, simultaneous with their departure in the current era of mass extinction"-- "For the past fifteen years, Lin May Saeed (b. 1973, Germany) has focused on the lives of animals and human-animal relations. With empathy and wit ,she tells stories, both ancient and modern, of animal subjugation, liberation, and cohabitation with humans, working toward a new iconography of interspecies solidarity. On the occasion of her first museum solo exhibition, this catalogue illustrates Saeed's drawings, paintings, and sculptures in materials such as paper, steel, and polystyrene foam. It includes two interpretive essays on the artist, Saeed's own writings, and a previously untranslated text on animality and otherness."--back cover.