Miami, FL
86°F, scattered clouds
Pérez Art Museum Miami
Introduction
Jason Seife: Coming to Fruition is a site-specific exhibition by Miami-based artist Jason Seife. Like many Miamians, Seife is the son of immigrants and of mixed heritage. He uses his Syrian and Cuban background as the inspiration for his artwork.
The exhibition features a series of concrete slabs painted with patterns that reference Persian carpets and details found in mosques and traditional Islamic art. Seife first digitally designs these detailed patterns, incorporating symbols that allude to his mixed heritage, recalling traditional weaving practices where colors and patterns are associated with specific locations and communities. Then, the artist carefully hand-paints these rich patterns onto the surfaces. Depending on one’s point of view, the work appears to be in various stages of completion—as if wandering between different eras of time.
A Song in Three Parts: Side A
A Song in Three Parts: Side A, 2022–23
Acrylic on hand-poured mortar, in three parts, and high-density urethane frame.
Upon entering the gallery, the wall to the left holds a triptych of three vertical concrete slabs held in an intricately carved frame. The frame is a soft gray color, resembling an architectural façade, although the material is actually high-density urethane cut by machine.
From left to right, the slabs appear to be in different stages of completion. The surface of the slab furthest to the left has the most visible concrete on its surface, with delicate patterns that make brief appearances around the edges and center of the slab with some of the underdrawings left visible.
From afar, the small visible patterns resemble satellite images of islands. We see hints of a colorful border made with repeating arching patterns of white and golden yellow against a sky-blue band filled with patterns in various bright colors. At the center of the second slab, a floral medallion shape appears. It is symmetrical with a sky-blue center filled with small golden flowers, various leaf shapes and white flared edges. The outer layer of the medallion is jade green with two smaller emerald green three-leafed flowers. A large area of navy-blue filled with hundreds of brightly colored flowers surrounds the medallion.
If the first slab resembled a satellite image of islands at sea, the third slab seems to be the reverse. It shows the most amount of Seife’s painted pattern, with just a few random patches of raw concrete throughout. The navy-blue area appears to have four smaller cream-colored medallions at each of its corners. The cream-colored medallions form a border between the navy-blue area and a smaller portion of emerald green that meets a straight golden border, forming a rectangle all around. Between this golden border and the edge of the slab, we see that the sky-blue band with paisley patterns wraps all the way around and contains eight, evenly spaced, smaller circular medallions. Overall, the pattern resembles that of an oriental rug.
A Song in Three Parts: Side B
Another triptych appears on the opposite wall. It seems to mirror the one across it with three concrete slabs held in an intricately carved frame of the same size.
This triptych reveals a fractal star pattern. The center of the first painting shows a perfectly symmetrical twelve-pointed yellow star with a circular, floral mandala pattern at its center. The pattern expands outwards from this central star shape and continues to break down into smaller, colorful shapes of green, jade, emerald, blue, navy, and red. Within these smaller shapes are hundreds of even smaller intricate patterns, almost as if looking through a kaleidoscope.
Everything in its Right Place
The exhibition culminates at the wall directly across the gallery entrance with a massive painting on canvas that is six feet tall and approximately sixteen and half feet across.
From afar, the concrete slabs in the adjacent triptychs appear to materialize as they approach this central painting. This massive painting features several brightly colored floral medallion patterns, like those found on the adjacent artworks. Each of the medallions appear to be about a foot and half in diameter and are all evenly spaced across the entire width of the painting in perfect symmetry. Surrounding these medallions are layers of kaleidoscopic floral patterns, painted in rich bright reds, yellows, blues, navy, gold, and assortment of bright colors—leaving not a single inch of the canvas uncovered. An intricately patterned dark blue wallpaper designed by the artist seems to expand the painting onto the gallery wall behind it.
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