Baseera Khan

Purple Heart (Psychedelic Prayer Rugs)

Baseera Khan is a New York-based artist whose multi-medium work attempts to resist the volatile social environments of capitalist-driven societies. Marrying elements of American consumer culture with Islamic spiritual practice, Khan gives visual form to the ways in which experiences of kinship, exile, and spirituality are shaped by pop cultural, economic, and social conditions. Her textile, sculpture, and performance works reflect Khan’s self-identification as a queer femme Muslim within the context of her Indian-Iranian-Afghani heritage and Texan immigrant experience, offering complex alternatives to the stereotypes of Islamic identity — particularly of Muslim womanhood — that Islamophobia manifests. At a time when many still question whether Muslim women can be empowered by their faith-based practices, Khan’s work seeks to disrupt sites of othering, censorship, and erasure: “iamuslima,” the artist’s first solo exhibition in New York, was titled after the term “Muslima” Khan had Nike stitch the word onto a pair of shoes in protest of the company’s ban of the words “Islam” and “Muslim” on its customizable sneaker models.