Cheek by Jowl

Stemming from a research period at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the works in Cheek by Jowl use historical artifacts from the years 100-500 CE, a period of great global cultural production. The robust exchange of objects and ideas from across the globe are overlapped with commonplace items found during Farooq’s daily commute to the museum. With a sustained focus on the way that museums write and locate history through the lenses of taxonomy, plunder, and colonial impulses, these works exemplify one way to bring seemingly disparate objects back into conversation with each other. Intricate, uncanny, and at times even humorous, each new arrangement serves to remind us that all objects are in a constant state of becoming, and that cross-pollination has always existed. With Cheek by Jowl Farooq is doubling down his efforts to rebuild severed ties between objects, regions, and cultures, and create space to reflect on ideas of cohesion and fracture, entanglement, and erasure. In these choreographed entanglements of present and past, historical artifacts become intertwined with their current environments, reminding us that they are as alive and relevant today as any object produced in its time. (Alex Bowron)