Khaled Sabsabi: A Hope

Campbelltown Arts Centre (C-A-C) in partnership with the Art Gallery of New South Wales (AGNSW) presents Khaled Sabsabi: A Hope—the second chapter of a survey exhibition held across both venues.  

Spanning more than two decades, A Hope is an invitation to explore Khaled Sabsabi’s multidisciplinary contemporary art practice and his unique perspective on the world. Sabsabi states, “our world is often described by a relationship between the material and the immaterial, between the physical and the spiritual. However, these binaries are not mutually exclusive.” Instead, Sabsabi seeks to collapse these divides, preferring to envision aspects of our world where the ordinary presents opportunities for moments of interaction and heightened states of spirituality. 

“A hope is in essence an offering of the in-between space—the slow and unseen space where changes like life can pass us by without noticing…Hope itself is a possibility, something that is familiar and common to us all and something that lives deep down in our humanity. It is the belief and intent of a better reality or circumstance. It sometimes embodies anxiety and fear and in other times joy and will. Regardless, hope requires patience and perseverance.”

A Hope features works such as Aajnya, originally featured in the exhibition Arabmade at Casual Powerhouse in 1998, recreated at C-A-C, which through the use of multisensory triggers such as scent and vibration, recalls an early memory from the Lebanese civil war; Bring the Silence, 2018, a major five-channel video installation presented at the 21st Biennale of Sydney; and 40, 2020, a newly commissioned multidisciplinary work which, at the centre of the exhibition, considers common social values that are inspired by our collective realities and human condition. 

A Hope at C-A-C (January 4–March 27, 2022) and A Promise at the AGNSW (July 18, 2020–January 10, 2021) offer a complementary interpretation of the exchange between spiritual belief and human aspiration made visible in Sabsabi’s practice. A Promise and A Hope: Khaled Sabsabi has been developed in partnership with the Art Gallery of New South Wales and Campbelltown Arts Centre. Co-curated by Khaled Sabsabi, Matt Cox (Curator Asian Art, AGNSW) and Adam Porter (Head of Curatorial, C-A-C).

About Khaled Sabsabi
Born in Tripoli, Lebanon in 1965, Khaled Sabsabi migrated to Australia in 1977 to flee the Lebanese civil war. His family settled in Western Sydney and this is where he continues to live and work. In 2001, since migrating to Australia, he travelled back to Lebanon and the surrounding region. This extended travel period became a significant moment in his creative career, forcing him to question, reflect and redefine my philosophical perspective and contemporary visual arts practice. In 2005, Sabsabi received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of New South Wales.

“I genuinely believe in the power of art as an effective and influential tool to communicate with people. As a full-time professional contemporary visual artist specialising in video, mixed media and site-specific installation work, my artistic process involves working across art mediums, geographical borders, and communities to create immersive and engaging art experiences. For over 30 years I have worked in detention centres, schools, prisons, refugee camps, settlements, hospitals, youth centres, public and private galleries in the Australian and international context.”

“I am inspired by what may define us as a society and I strive to make artwork that reflects human collectiveness, while questioning ideological principles and complexities of identity politics. I make artwork that is in constant flux between the everyday and the metaphysical, in hope to find ways to enlighten our understanding of universal dynamics, which is far more complex and ultimately, more inconceivable than our physical selves.”

Khaled Sabsabi was awarded the Australia Council for the Arts, CCD fellowship in 2001; Helen Lempriere Travelling Art Scholarship 2010; 60th Blake Prize 2011, MCG Basil Sellers fellowship 2014; Fishers Ghost Prize 2014; Western Sydney ARTS NSW Fellowship 2015 and Sharjah Art Programme Prize 2016. Sabsabi is represented in public and private collections, both national and international and has participated in over 80 major solo and group exhibitions in Australia and abroad. Sabsabi has participated in the 5th Marrakech Biennale; 18th Biennale of Sydney; 9th Shanghai Biennale; Sharjah Biennial 11; 1st Yinchuan Biennale; 3rd Kochi Muziris Biennale; Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art 2018 and 21st Biennale of Sydney. He is represented by Milani Gallery, Brisbane.

About Campbelltown Arts Centre
Located on the edge of Sydney, Campbelltown Arts Centre (C-A-C) is in a unique position to forge collaborative exchanges between artists, disciplines and communities through the creation of new curatorial situations and challenging streams of practice.

Using the edge as a starting point, C-A-C creates a secure platform for communities and artists to take risks, challenge perceptions, confront issues and raise questions through the commissioning of new works. These new works invite collaboration, partnership, local, national and international dialogue, the juxtaposition of new and traditional techniques and cross-disciplinary approaches. Contemporary artists are at the forefront of C-A-C’s programming and through consultation with communities, we deliver a program that profiles contemporary visual arts, performance, dance, music, live art and emergent practices.

Located on Dharawal land, C-A-C is proudly owned by the people of Campbelltown. A cultural facility of Campbelltown City Council, assisted by the NSW Government through Create NSW and by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body. Campbelltown Arts Centre receives support from the Crown Resorts Foundation and the Packer Family Foundation and the Neilson Foundation.