Exhibitions
Art as a suture: Kader Attia at the CAAC
The art of repair through reconstruction after trauma is one of the characteristic elements of the work of Kader Attia, an artist whose multifaceted work can be seen at the Andalusian Center for Contemporary Art (CAAC) until January 18, 2026. This is the first solo exhibition of the French-Algerian artist in Spain.
Kader Attia, 'Intifada: The Endless Rhizomes of Revolution', 2016. ' Paradise Requested'. CAAC, Seville. Photographer: Pablo Ballesteros.
Under the title El paraíso perdido (The Lost Paradise ), an exhibition curated by Jimena Blázquez, a broad set of emblematic works is displayed alongside Attia's more recent works and productions, where the physical, symbolic and structural wound is addressed and explored as an active space for thought.
This wound will recur in many of his works, which are displayed through sculptures, installations, videos, collages, and objects made from materials as diverse as marble, glass, wood, papier-mâché, and steel. Kader Attia's Paradise Lost at the CAAC will feature works such as The Dogon Venus, Ghost, Intifada, and Reinterpretation, all created between 2027 and 2024.
Kader Attia, 'Ghost', 2007–2025 . ' The Paradise Requested'. CAAC, Seville. Photographer: Pablo Ballesteros.
The Dogon Venus from 2024 opens this spectacular exhibition, a sculpture that superimposes a classical Greco-Roman base with a carved trunk reminiscent of traditional African aesthetics. A fragmented journey through trauma as a reparative gesture; the works can be seen in the North Cloister of the former monastery, with the exhibition closing with Following the Modern Genealogy from 2020 and The Great Mirror of the World from 2017.
Jimena Blázquez explains that the exhibition at the CAAC in Seville "proposes an ethic of fragility as a transformative force. For the artist, repairing is not restoring what is lost, but listening to the open wounds of the past and reorganizing its fragments as a possibility." Kader Attia is an artist who draws on the experiences of two disparate cultural identities: Algerian and French. Attia interrogates the sociopolitical complexities rooted in histories of colonialism and cultural concealment.
Kader Attia, 'The Dogon Venus', 2024. 'The Requested Paradise'. CAAC, Seville. Photographer: Pablo Ballesteros.
