I first became aware of Jordan Nassar when he was a young queer artist making artist’s books and zines. When I look back at his work in that milieu, I see a thread that connects to the art presented in “REVELATION,” his recent exhibition at James Cohan. Artist’s books and zines have the quality of objecthood. The viewer may get lost in an image within a zine, but that zine does not blend in and become part of the wall. The image in a zine is always an image in an object that has weight in your hand. Conversely, it is very easy to forget, when looking at art hanging on a wall, that the images you are looking at are not just images but are physical things.

        Interestingly, what immediately struck me about was the presence that the works had as objects. The pieces on display, though hung on the wall, were not paintings or works on paper, but five large assemblages of textiles and a pair of impressive mosaics. When looking at these pieces, I found my mind pondering what their internal structure might be, imagining the weight they must possess, contemplating, in the case of the mosaics, how the walls supported this installation and how the works activated the room.

        All the textiles were composed of various panels of hand-embroidered cotton on cotton. In each of these, one panel depicted a landscape. The other panels contained intricate geometric patterns. An elegant relationship was created between the geometric panels and the landscape panels through the use of the patterns.

        In the geometric panels, there are, in fact, two patterns—one that is created by the areas that are embroidered as opposed to the areas which are not. For example, in When the sun does justice to life and death in the middle of the sky / a mask of steel descends over its face, two large panels consist of what I perceive as a feather-like pattern. The line work of the pattern is created by leaving thin lines of supporting fabric unembroidered. In the top panel, the vertical rows of “feathers” are chocolatey brown. The negative space is a steel gray. In every fourth row, the negative space is an electric blue. In the panels below it, the color pattern is reversed, feathers are gray and the negative space brown, and, in this panel, every fifth row of negative space is the electric blue. But the overall outline “feather” pattern remains the same and, in fact, remains the same in the third panel—the landscape panel. Here, the arbitrary color pattern of brown and gray disappears. This panel contains a depiction of a mesa of rich desert colors—ochre, fuchsia, gold, orange, sage. The mesa is surrounded by a perfect blue sky, an egg yolk sun, and a childlike grass green ground. However, the feather pattern continues and gives the landscape a veil, as though looking through a lace curtain or through the mistiness of recollection.

        This play with pattern suggests a sense of whimsy, even while, the works simultaneously feel austere and minimal. There was a part of my eye that longed for the “feather” pattern in each panel to align perfectly with the next panel. But the fact that it doesn’t certainly felt like a choice made by the artist, or, a consequence of the nature of the materials themselves which were “made with the participation of Palestinian craftswomen living and working in Bethlehem, Ramallah, and Hebron.” In a piece like War in the Vacant Sky, where multiple patterns are employed on seven panels that surround an eighth which depicts a crescent moon, the juxtaposition of patterns that abut each other adds a certain charm or air of chance.

        The textiles occupied one room of the gallery while in an adjoining room two mosaics filled the walls. The mosaics are quite an interesting project. Nassar recreated, or perhaps better said, reinterpreted or reimagined, two Byzantine mosaic artifacts from the fifth or sixth century which are presently located at BenGurion Airport near Tel-Aviv.

        Bisan (Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed shalt thou be when thou goest out) (Deuteronomy 28:6) portrays a diagonal grid pattern of shell pink, pale blue, and ashy green. Each square of the grid contains a green and teal bird, reminding me of both Monk Parakeets and Pigeons. A burnt orange and gray mosaic frame runs along the edges. The quote from which the piece takes its title is inscribed in Arabic at the top. In the original mosaic, the birds wear red ribbons; Nassar eliminates that detail.

        The second mosaic, Bethlehem-In-The-Galilee, was installed in a corner, with part on one wall and part on the adjoining wall. It hangs sideways, vis-a-vis the original, which may have been a decision based simply on making it fit. That choice however does bring every detail of the work to eye-level. It is also useful to keep in mind that this is all relative given that the original was installed as a floor. Within a frame of intertwined green, orange, and grey running key patterns are grape-vine medallions, each containing birds, animals, or flora. At one end, there is a sort of Palladian window or fan. All the elements are fanciful, colorful, and delightful in the way they add a peculiar soulfulness to the austere white cube gallery.

        Together, the textile works, with their Palestinian origin, and the mosaics with their Byzantine lineage, combine the force of their pure physicality to create a palpable sense of place. By placing these selected works in this space, the artist has accomplished the creation of a site—not simply the display of a collection of images. Nassar uses color and texture—he uses yarn and cut glass to create stationary objects that transport the viewer. Here, one visits, without leaving New York, the Middle East. This Middle East, however, is not strictly the one that fills the news or political debates. Nassar presents a place of craft, of beauty, of world history, of Abraham. He does it with heart and some gentle levity. He does it with grace. It is an act of beauty.

Paul Moreno is an artist and writer who lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. He organizies New York Queer Zine Fair and is the New York City Editor for the New Art Examiner.