Amir Bey
Type: Workshop, Residency
Art Form: Visual Art, multi-disciplinary sculpture
Grade Level: K-12
Amir Bey is a New York City-based mixed media sculptor, occult artist, curator, performance artist, writer, radio program producer, and teaching artist. Over the years an important focus of his work has been the face, and the mask. The face “expresses every mood and articulates all thoughts.” For Amir, the face has a vocabulary comprised of a small number of simple components uniquely arranged that are universally recognized.
Testimony
Over the years, Amir has created numerous art series -- one being The Procession of Folk, faces carved in stone, masks that can be worn in performances, or can be hung as part of an exhibition. The Procession of Folk #3, are 12 faceted glass windows permanently installed by the Metropolitan Transit Authority at the Mount Eden Station for the #4 Train in the Bronx.
A multifaceted artist, Amir has performed with or had his work in events with Idris Ackamoor, Rhodessa Jones, Saco Yasuma, Lorna Littleway, Maria Mitchell, and Tayuta Pilgrim. Amir joined multi-woodwind player, J.D. Parran for Elevated Moon: a ‘ritualistic happening’ with a combination of sound, movement, visual vibrance, and light projections.
Amir has exhibited and collaborated internationally, in Japan, Turkey, Martinique, Spain, and Germany. As a curator, he has organized over 100 exhibits and events, often combining exhibitions and performances held mainly in the New York City area.
Mythology and history are the foundation of his work. His interest in the mystic arts include tarot, astrology, and coffee readings. His studies of palmistry, handwriting analysis, and face reading provide an extended approach to his art, very similar to a musician who experiments with different instruments. His visual arts practice includes multi-media sculpture, performance art, Sumi-e painting, as well as set and costume design using fabric, silk-screening, and Papier Mache.
His work is in the collections of the Lower East Side Printshop, NYC; The Mwanga Collection, Oakland, CA; The Printmaking Workshop, NYC; and The Schomberg Collection, NYC. Bey's work has been included in numerous exhibitions including Sheidas, Galeri X, Instanbul, Turkey; Flying Loa, Suffolk County Community College; The Faces of Giza, the Egyptian Embassy, Washington, DC; Bronx Bound, Lehman College Art Gallery, Bronx, NY; and Whirlers, Gallery X, NYC. His public art is installed at the Mount Eden Avenue train station commissioned through the Metropolitan Transit Authority Arts for Transit program. Bey has also curated exhibitions at the Bronx River Art Center, Bronx, NY and The Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx, NY.
His self-published works include The Equinox Celebration Tarot, in English and Japanese, The Equinox Celebration Tarot Reader, a unique concept of a book featuring the images of his tarot that allow individuals to give themselves a quick reading by opening the book to different pages.