Exhibitions (Summer 2024)

 Begonia Labs

Watermelon Seeds 

On view from July 12- August 30, 2024. 

Opening reception on Friday, July 12th from 6-8 pm, and a discussion with the artists at the Lab on Friday, August 9th from  6-8 pm.

Begonia Labs, Engine for Art, Democracy & Justice (EADJ)

The Engine for Art Democracy and Justice presents Watermelon Seeds, a summer exhibit at Begonia Labs featuring the artworks of AB Bedran, Ali El-Chaer, Beizar Aradini, and David Onri Anderson. These artists were born in Nashville andmany are currently living and working in the city. AB Bedran and Ali El-Chaer are Palestinian, Beizar Aradini is Kurdish, and David Onri Anderson has a Sephardic Jewish background. The artists in this exhibit are bringing together their forms of expression for grief, memory, hope, loss, and renewal with various artistic practices, which include painting, drawing, printmaking, weaving, sculpting, and installation.

“The watermelon has become a symbol of solidarity with Palestine, representing the Palestinian flag colors. This show is about the future and hope for a renewal of the people of Palestine as horrifying genocide and war crimes continuously occur through the effects of Israeli Nationalism. The artists in the show share grief for the loss of innocent lives, but they also hold onto hope through creating art. The exhibit becomes a coming together of Palestinians, Kurds, and Jews, all celebrating the people of the Earth from our point of view in Nashville, Tennessee. Our grief is hard to express in words and one moment, thus we create shrines to commemorate the lives of those who have passed and those who are suffering. The artworks express feelings that have been felt for many years and the lasting effects they leave us. Although it may be impossible to fully express, this show is a hopeful gesture to start a conversation and move people. 

This place of Nashville, in all the changes and transitions it has gone through, also feels like a microcosm of the world changing in all its violence and splendor. There is much to grieve as well as much to celebrate, yet the darkness feels more present these days than perhaps it has in a while. In hopes of not being too short-sighted as to what the future may bring, we make art in hopes of creating a new world and a new culture where we can live peacefully amongst each other, without having to all conform to the same political and social identities. We want to be the change we want to see. Art making, call and response, and having difficult conversations is all a part of our mode of carving a new path for a more compassionate culture.”

-David Onri Anderson, curator and participating artist for the Watermelon Seeds exhibition

Press coverage of the exhibition.

About the Curator: 

David Onri Anderson is a Tennessee-born French-Algerian Jewish artist, musician, and curator. He graduated from Watkins College of Art in Nashville with the Anny Gowa Purchase Award in 2016. He has had solo exhibitions at Patrick Painter Gallery in Los Angeles, CA, Blaa Galleri Copenhagen, DK (upcoming), Harpy Gallery in Rutherford, NJ, David Lusk Gallery in Nashville, TN, and Atlanta Contemporary, amongst others. In 2020 he published a book of drawings with Zürich-based artist book company, Nieves. His work has been reviewed, exhibited, and collected internationally with works in permanent collections including the Soho House in Los Angeles, CA and Nashville, TN, The Joseph Hotel, and the Metro Arts Library in Nashville, TN, amongst others. Anderson is the founder and curator of an artist-run space called Electric Shed Gallery in Nashville, TN (2018-present). His work has been reviewed in Art in America, Artnet, BURNAWAY, DailyLazy, and more.

About the Artists: 

A.B. Bedran is an artist and writer based in Nashville, TN. They received their BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art and have been exhibiting and curating since 2018. Their work focuses on identity as it relates to their lived experience as a Queer Palestinian in the diaspora. These topics are explored through collage, textiles, and poetry. They started the 11:11 Collective, a gallery and creative space run from their home. The purpose of the collective is to uplift the voices of queer, BIPOC, and disabled artists.

Ali El-Chaer (b. 1995, they/he) is a trans diasporic Palestinian writer, illustrator, and artist, currently living in Nashville, TN. They received their bachelor’s in fine arts at Austin Peay State University in 2018. They have shown in numerous group exhibitions, including Moving, Transfer at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, OH (2024); Watermelon Seeds at Begonia Labs at Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN (2024);  We Are Sorry to Inform You That, curated by Adele Jarrar for MNFA gallery in Amman, Jordan (2022); Queer Identity at The Dirty Spread Collective, Bristol, UK (2022); The Divine: Beyond the Bounds of Queerness at the Nepantla Cultural Arts Gallery, Seattle, WA (2022). They were also selected as a resident artist for the Bethany Artist Community in New York in 2024. El-Chaer has gone on to found a community collective, Nour Nashville, catering towards political education, organizing, and outreach in Nashville, TN.

Beizar Aradini (b.1991) was born in Mardin, Kurdistan, and immigrated with her family to Nashville, Tennessee in1992. Her work unravels her family’s story as immigrants and examines cultural displacement through craft and fiber arts. Aradini has been featured in many exhibitions nationally and in Bê Welat: The Unexpected Storytellers at nGbk Gallery in Berlin, Germany. Her artwork has also been exhibited at the Frist Art Museum as part of the We Count: First-Time Voters exhibition which received an Award of Excellence from the Tennessee Association of Museums. Her work has been featured in local publications such as Four Women Artists Reflect on Peoples and Places in the Nashville Scene and The Ties That Binds in Native Magazine. In 2021, She was awarded Best in Show in the Best of Tennessee Craft 2021 Biennial at the Tennessee State Museum. She was recently selected as an artist in residency at Arquetopia International Artist Residency and completed an Andean Textile and Weaving workshop during her month-long stay in Urubamba, Peru, an opportunity that was funded in part by a scholarship from Tennessee Craft.