Wave Pool at The Armory

Wave Pool finds ways to make contemporary art accessible, interactive, engaging, and integral for all communities. To this end, in our third Armory exhibition, we present a space for reflection and empowerment.

Featuring over 225 leading international galleries, representing more than 35 countries and showcasing over 800 artists, The Armory Show is a galvanizing force in the art world, presenting works from the top galleries and museums around the world.  Wave Pool is the only gallery from Cincinnati and one of only 11 included in the Not-for-profit section of this internationally-renowned art fair, which will take place this coming September 7–10th, 2023.

Wave Pool was selected to present our three most recent Welcome Editions by artists Baseera Khan, Lorena Molina, and Sheida Soleimani. Welcome Editions are limited edition art objects designed by nationally recognized artists and fabricated at least in part by Cincinnati-based refugees and immigrant artisans. To date, previous editions have also been created with artists Chris Johanson and Johanna Jackson, Caroline Woolard, Pedro Reyes, Terence Hammonds, Jeffrey Gibson, and Vanessa German.

Welcome Editions are limited edition art objects designed by nationally-recognized artists and fabricated at least in part by refugee and immigrant women living in Cincinnati, Ohio. Often functional, affordable and always collectible, the editions appeal both to collectors of contemporary art and those seeking to support refugees and social justice. Editions have been created with artists Chris Johanson and Johanna Jackson, Caroline Woolard, Pedro Reyes, Terence Hammonds, Jeffrey Gibson, Vanessa German, and most recently with Baseera Khan. The works have resulted in the providing work and training for over 30 local immigrant artisans. Profits from Welcome Editions feed back into sustaining community programs at Wave Pool and funding future editions.

Profits from Welcome Editions feed back into sustaining community programs at the Welcome Project and funding future editions.

Please email us if you are interested in purchasing. See you in New York!

Sheida Soleimani

Kooha Laleh Daran (There Are Tulips in the Mountains)

For Wave Pool’s 9th Welcome Edition, Iranian-American artist Sheida Soleimani is creating a field of cast aluminum tulips, representing the first 100 protestors that have been killed in Iran since the slaying of Mahsa Amini in September of 2022.

Red tulips are a long-standing revolutionary symbol in Iran, associated with martyrdom. The resulting group of sculptures will be displayed upright from the ground of Wave Pool’s Armory booth to form a “field” of flowers. As individual sculptures, the tulips will be “plucked” from the field and lay flat on a small wooden platform.

Each tulip is unique, originally sculpted in wax by a refugee artisan working with Heartfelt Tidbits before being cast, and engraved with a name of one of the hundreds of protestors killed in Iran in the past year in both Farsi and English.

Soleimani will also have a concurrent exhibition at Denny Gallery in SOHO, opening September 5th, 2023; with an opening reception on Friday, September 8th, 6-8 PM.

Edition of 100
Lost-wax cast aluminum, solvent based red dye oxide brushed on application
2023

Tulips are $2,000 each

Condensed Artist Statement:

“[…] Each laleh symbolizes one of the first 100 women to be murdered during the start of the WLF revolution last year—the first flower cast was of Mahsa Zhina Amini. Each flower has a woman’s name written in Farsi and in English, and is part of the collective as well as an individual. As we come up on the one year anniversary of the start of the revolution, I hope to remind those of you that may have forgotten that this movement is far from over. Support and uphold the voices of Iranian and Kurdish women. […]”

Lorena Molina

At What Cost?

For Wave Pool’s 8th Welcome Edition, Lorena Molina, in partnership with local Latine women from Casa de Paz, created a series of 4 embroidered tapestry photographs. In this work, Molina presents viewers with appropriated images of sites where Republican Governors such as Greg Abbot (TX) and Ron DeSantis (FL) use vulnerable populations of migrants as pawns to make their (questionable) political points against immigration. Molina critiques American ideals of safety and freedom,—concepts so revered and celebrated in this country—and asks viewers to question, who benefits and who ultimately pays the price for these convictions.

The women who embroidered this edition are from Casa de Paz, an organization that helps Latine women and children who are survivors of domestic violence. These women gained meaningful and gainful employment through the production of this series that speaks to the issues that they have also faced as immigrants to this country.

Set of 4, Edition of 6
Duotone prints, text, embroidery, walnut wood frames
2023

$3,500 each, or set of 4 for $12,000

Titles left to right, top to down:

Baseera Khan

MUSLIMS = AMERICA

Wave Pool’s Welcome Edition #7 is a very limited unique edition of 13 weavings designed by renowned artist Baseera Khan.  Khan is a New York-based performance, sculpture, and installation artist who makes work to discuss materials and their economies, the effects of this relationship to labor, family structures, religion, and spiritual well being.

Similar to Khan’s Act Up (Psychedelic Prayer Rugs) from 2017, which combine visual iconography traditional to Islam with brightly colored symbols of personal significance to the artist, MUSLIMS = AMERICA employs the Islamic prayer rug to contemporary secular concepts—weaving together the artist’s political and queer alliances with a daily spiritual practice. 

A group of five Bhutanese refugee women living in Cincinnati wove and embroidered these pieces. Weaving work done by Gita Rai, Durga Limbu, Bishnu Limbu, Laxmi Rai, and Sita Gurung with the assistance and training of Rowe Schnure. Embroidery by Fabiola Rodriguez.

Edition of 13
Wool
2022

$7,500 each