Hayv Kahraman creates exquisite figurative paintings on large linen panels that often depict a singular woman with iridescent pale skin and inky black hair. Her history in the war-torn country of Iraq and her adolescence in Sweden as a refugee intertwine with ideas of feminine collectivity, identity, belonging, and diasporic cultural memory. In her recent work, she intentionally cuts into the canvases–her painted body–and then weaves in fragments of other shredded paintings, creating newly "mended" representations of female bodies and "healed" memories of past trauma. Kahraman was born in Baghdad, Iraq in 1981, and now lives and works in Los Angeles. Kahraman was shortlisted for the 2018 and the 2011 Jameel Prize at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and has received the "Excellence in Cultural Creativity" award from the Global Thinkers Forum. The exhibition "Hayv Kahraman" is the 52nd in the Pomona College Museum of Art's Project Series, which presents Southern California artists in focused exhibitions and is curated by Rebecca McGrew. This exhibition is supported in part by the Pasadena Arts Alliance. Additional support provided by Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, Jack Shainman Gallery, New York, and The Third Line, Dubai. Image: Hayv Kahraman, Read Me from Right to Left, 2017, Oil on linen triptych, 70 in. x 150 in. WASSART Collection, Switzerland