For May I 2020, Mandy El-Sayegh has created seven “Piece” paintings―multilayered works juxtaposing silkscreen, collage, and painting with disparate fragments of text, found imagery, and the artist’s own gestures, inviting multiple readings and reflections on how we absorb and interpret meaning.
El-Sayegh’s highly process-driven practice is rooted in an exploration of material, aesthetics, and language. Executed in a wide variety of media ranging from densely layered paintings to sculpture, installation, works on paper, and video, El-Sayegh’s work investigates the formation and dissolution of systems of order, be they bodily, linguistic, or political.
Working intuitively with a strong sense of aesthetics, El-Sayegh begins each painting with found fragments, which constitute the “parts” she brings together to offer an analytical look at present-day political structures, social systems, and pop-culture―as well as how these overlap and diverge.
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
MAY I 2020, 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
63 x 57.09 inches
160 x 145 cm
$35,000
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
MAY I 2020, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
63 x 57.09 inches
160 x 145 cm
$35,000
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
MAY I 2020, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
63 x 57.09 inches
160 x 145 cm
$35,000
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
MAY I 2020, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
63 x 57.09 inches
160 x 145 cm
$35,000
#sold
InquireBoth the title of this presentation and the works themselves offer insight into El-Sayegh’s forensic dissection of symbols and words―and the ways in which they often lack inherent meaning.
May I 2020, refers to the title of a work in this presentation and is also a reference to El-Sayegh’s repeated use of images of Theresa May, as well as the popular BBC One and HBO TV series I May Destroy You, written, co-directed, produced, and acted by Michaela Coel.
Calligraphy by El-Sayegh’s father
Reference material for May I
Newspaper clipping from the Evening Standard, 2017, featuring Theresa May drinking from a coconut
Reference material for May I
Still from the BBC One and HBO series I May Destroy You
Reference material for May I
“It’s a forensic thing, I’m laying it all out. I want everything in there, the political, the sexual...there is a terror in excess.”
Mandy El-Sayegh in The Guardian
May I 2020 is both a recognition of the significant cultural impact of the women depicted within our broader social landscape (in what El-Sayegh refers to as solidarity appropriation), and a radical disidentification with Theresa May and her hostile treatment of immigrants and asylum seekers. As a whole, the works in this presentation illustrate El-Sayegh’s implicit assertion of the violence inherent in binary structures―a theme that pervades the artist’s practice.
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Co-Occurring, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 45.67 x 28.35 inches
116 x 72 cm
$35,000
#reserve
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Anatomical illustrations of children
Reference material for Co-Occurring
Reference material for Co-Occurring
“Co-Occuring is another cut up diptych that was initially one piece. I was thinking about cells splitting as we grow and about cell replication. Those two scribbles―which are silkscreens under the anatomical painting―are from an archive of early personal drawings. The text is taken from a British headline that says ‘WE’RE TOO OLD AND WHITE TO WIN,’ which is about party politics propaganda. So you are just getting ‘WE’RE TOO’ on one side [of the painting], which I really liked. At the time, I was thinking about the virus, how the scribbles look like a virus and the scramble of DNA.
You can kind of see the logic a bit more in the way I posted it [on Instagram] when I first went into lockdown. This kind of meme logic is how ideas replicate and associations are made depending on the time they are birthed. At the time I was watching Outbreak, and was thinking about my research on virology, which reminded me of the scribbles, which led me to thinking about the anatomy book I have and the colors of the illustrations. This sort of sequential process is very much how my brain works.”
— Mandy El-Sayegh
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Occupy (ways&means), 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen
58.27 x 40.16 inches
148 x 102 cm
$30,000
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Occupy (ways&means), 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen
58.27 x 40.16 inches
148 x 102 cm
$30,000
#available
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Occupy (ways&means), 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen
58.27 x 40.16 inches
148 x 102 cm
$30,000
#available
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Occupy (ways&means), 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen
58.27 x 40.16 inches
148 x 102 cm
$30,000
#available
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
(YourArea2020), 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
92.13 x 69.29 inches
234 x 176 cm
$40,000
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
(YourArea2020), 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
92.13 x 69.29 inches
234 x 176 cm
$40,000
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
(YourArea2020), 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
92.13 x 69.29 inches
234 x 176 cm
$40,000
#reserve
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
(YourArea2020), 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
92.13 x 69.29 inches
234 x 176 cm
$40,000
#reserve
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
(YourArea2020), 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
92.13 x 69.29 inches
234 x 176 cm
$40,000
#reserve
Inquire“It’s about how words [and images] can take on their own life, independent of the message they’re conveying, and that mutation can have its own surrealist logic—it’s also about treating language as a kind of material; treating language as mutable and plastic.”
Mandy El-Sayegh in Ocula
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
#sold
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
#sold
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
blue target, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen and collaged elements
Diptych, each: 72.44 x 72.44 inches
184 x 184 cm
$60,000
#sold
InquireThis series features fragments of both personal and more general ephemera that includes images from Kylie Jenner’s Instagram, Theresa May on a foreign affairs visit in India, 1980s softcore pornography, pages from women’s magazines, the Financial Times, and British populist newspapers, Arabic calligraphy penned by El-Sayegh’s father, and anatomical studies.
El-Sayegh collages these and other components together, subsequently obscuring or adding elements to the resulting combination of found material by drawing and painting directly onto the works. In the process, she embraces this disparate array of signifiers, revealing the implicit constructions embedded within our systems of language and thought and challenging our assumptions about the world around us.
Instagram post by Kylie Jenner
Reference material for blue target
Calligraphy by Mandy El-Sayegh’s father
Reference material for blue target
Cover of LOVE magazine, 2015 (left); French pornography magazine, 1980s (right)
Reference material for blue target
Shooting target
Reference material for blue target
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Deals, 2020
Oil and mixed media on linen
88.98 x 68.5 inches
226 x 174 cm
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Deals, 2020
Oil and mixed media on linen
88.98 x 68.5 inches
226 x 174 cm
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Deals, 2020 (detail)
Oil and mixed media on linen
88.98 x 68.5 inches
226 x 174 cm
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Deals, 2020 (detail)
Oil and mixed media on linen
88.98 x 68.5 inches
226 x 174 cm
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Deals, 2020 (detail)
Oil and mixed media on linen
88.98 x 68.5 inches
226 x 174 cm
#sold
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Fore, 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
86.61 x 55.12 inches
220 x 140 cm
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MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Fore, 2020
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
86.61 x 55.12 inches
220 x 140 cm
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Fore, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
86.61 x 55.12 inches
220 x 140 cm
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Fore, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
86.61 x 55.12 inches
220 x 140 cm
#reserve
Inquire
MANDY EL-SAYEGH
Fore, 2020 (detail)
Oil on silkscreened linen with collaged elements
86.61 x 55.12 inches
220 x 140 cm
#reserve
Inquire
Misrecognition (reference materials—newspaper, reading notes on Fanon, Benjamin, Jabra and Kristeva), 2018–2020
Misrecognition (reference materials—newspaper, reading notes on Fanon, Benjamin, Jabra and Kristeva), 2018–2020
Misrecognition (reference materials—newspaper, reading notes on Fanon, Benjamin, Jabra and Kristeva), 2018–2020
Inquire about works by Mandy El-Sayegh: inquire@lehmannmaupin.com
Mandy El-Sayegh, 2020. Photo by Abtin Eshraghi
Mandy El-Sayegh’s (b. 1985, Malaysia, lives and works in London, United Kingdom) highly process-driven practice is rooted in an exploration of material and language. Executed in a wide range of media, including densely layered paintings, sculpture, installation, diagrams, and sound and video, El-Sayegh’s work investigates the formation and break-down of systems of order, be they bodily, linguistic, or political. She is particularly interested in exploring the Part-Whole relationship–how something significant yet unpremeditated emerges and comes into being through various smaller, micro-interactions or repetitions. She physically demonstrates this by collaging disparate fragments, text, and found imagery, and layering them with materials like latex, rubber, and clay that mimic organic matter. Through simple, repetitive patterns such as a hand-painted grid or geometric molds, formal and narrative synthesis occurs that is not consciously intended or anticipated.
Click here to read El-Sayegh’s full biography.
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Pictured at top of page: Portrait of Mandy El-Sayegh by Abtin Eshraghi. Artwork photos for blue target, Occupy (ways&means), Co-Occurring, and MAY I 2020 by Jack Hems.