Rasheed Araeen, Rhapsody in Four Colours, 2018
Photograph: Edmund Sumner
Photograph: Edmund Sumner
Architectural elevation and one of Rasheed Araeen's drawings, annotated
Powder coating at Hastings Paint and Powder Finishers
Installation. Photograph: Rebecca Heald
Photograph: Edmund Sumner
Photograph: Edmund Sumner
Artist: Rasheed Araeen
Client: Aga Khan Development Network
Location: Aga Khan Centre, Handyside Street, London, N1C 4AL
The Aga Khan Development Network invited my colleague Tamsin Dillon and I to commission an artwork for the new Aga Khan Centre at King’s Cross.
We ran a selection process that resulted in the appointment of Rasheed Araeen.
Rasheed devised a 35-metre high sculpture that fills the building’s atrium wall and that celebrates the connection between twentieth century geometric abstraction and the achievements of Islamic Civilisation. Architect Gary Kamemoto of Maki and Associates who designed the building said he could not imagine a more befitting artwork for the space.