b. 1993, Plattsburgh, New York; lives and works in London

Tallest Person In The Room
2019
House paint, found yarn, glue, on canvas
top: 83 x 28 in | bottom: 25 x 26 in

Amber Khan is a mixed-media artist from Honolulu, currently residing in London. Her practice explores spatiotemporal identities, nonlinear realities, cultural production, and the natural world through painting, sculptures, and installations. She does this by employing imagery from the natural world of Hawaiʻi and its unique cultural references in a playful manner. She utilizes papier-mâché, wood, tape, fiber, paint, and natural objects to materialize these concepts.

As a child of an American mother and immigrant Pakistani father, Khan’s upbringing was distinct from Kānaka and kamaʻāina experiences, and it did not fit a conventional American narrative. As a result, her sense of belonging and place have always felt disoriented; as if an outsider in the place with which she is most familiar. The paradoxical position places her work in an environment of active realization within reality. Khan is interested in hybrid experiences of identity, of how we belong to place and to each other in a multitude of ways, and how each of us develops our own perspective by synthesizing a myriad influences. Khan sees the natural world as one influence all of us share — a connecting point for our individual and collective histories.

The narrative in her work aims to set our gaze to the past, holistically acknowledge the present, and gain traction toward an informed future. Khan’s hope is that her work provides a comprehensive and ultimately deeper context for understanding and respecting our position within the natural world, our historical engagement with it, and our continuing impact on it.

Khan received her BA in Journalism from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa in Honolulu and her MFA in Sculpture from London Metropolitan University in London. Her work has been featured in both regional and international exhibitions including Iceland’s Fresh Winds International Art Biennale; the Cyprus College of Art in Paphos, Cyprus; the biannual Fruga Art Trail in Rab, Croatia; and in London and Honolulu. // ColourAmber.com

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