Opening Reception Saturday, July 29, 2006 from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m.  Exhibition runs through September 15, 2006

Opening in CEPA’s Window on Main Street will be a new Public Art Installation entitled One Night in New York b y Jaishri Abichandani.  This multimedia installation incorporates video, sound, kinetic light boxes and still photography to present a personal portrait of Muslim drag queens.  Abichandani states of the work, “I am interested in the moment of transcendence when fantasy becomes real.  Many of the Muslim drag queens in this series have sought asylum from their countries on grounds of sexual orientation.  They face adversity and alienation on multiple levels in their daily lives.  These images offer a space of acceptance and imagination in sharp contrast to their experiences.  The images in this series make no attempt at an in depth documentary look at the lives of my gay South Asian friends in New York City; they are instead moments when fantasy is achieved in life by a collaboration between subject and artist, space and spectator.”

Jaishri Abichandani was born and mostly raised in Bombay India.  Her work investigates the relationship between the natural, unnatural and supernatural from a feminist perspective using photography, performance, video and sculpture.  She activates feminist networks in New York (sawcc.org) as well as London (richmix.org.uk/raw).  Solo exhibitions include Nature Morte & Gallery Chemould in India, the Castle of Good Hope in Capetown and NYU APA Studies Institute Gallery. In 2000 she was granted the Enfoco New Works Award and in 2005 she curated Fatal Love: South Asian American Art Now at the Queens Museum of Art and received a Masters in Visual Arts from Goldsmiths College, University of London. She currently lives in New York City and works as the Director of Public Projects at the Queens Museum of Art.