ARTIST BIO | STATEMENT | CV

BIO:

​Shaleen Garba is a contemporary artist based in Atlanta, GA, who communicates her art through the language of color, organic shapes, and expressive mark-making. In addition to traditional brushes, she uses pallet knives, spray bottles, or her fingers to help scratch the painted surface. She continues to explore her relationship with paint and the various tools she uses. It's a never-ending journey of humility, confidence, and gladness. 

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Garba wanted to be an artist from a young age, as evident in her third-grade autobiography homework back in 1994. She attended the Academy of Art University, concentrating in fine arts. And through many trials, errors, and perseverance, her style emerged as colorful and joyous, intuitively playing with shapes that render a smile. Influenced by Pablo Picasso's Rose Period, Garba uses cheerful orange and pink hues to show play and lightheartedness. For Garba, making art is an essential, emotional declaration when words just won't do.

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Her work has been displayed at the Atlanta College of Art in Atlanta, GA, New York City's Times Square billboards, the Sewell Mill Cultural Center and Serendipity Labs, Atlanta for her solo exhibitions, Yonkers, New York, the M.A.D.S. Art Gallery in Milan, Italy, the Art 4 You Gallery in Dubai, Collective 131 Gallery, Spotlight on Art and many juried shows.

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Keep up with the latest on Instagram @shaleen.art

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STATEMENT:

What interests Shaleen is the intuitive use of bold brushstrokes and shapes on top of delicate layers that pay homage to life's jubilance. The color choices in her paintings create energetic work that mimics a celebration! The abstract compositions are not precalculated but are organically formed as paint, pencil, oil stick, and water are applied to the canvas. These varied applications allow fine lines, saturated fields of color, or blurred pools of diluted pigment to dance across the surface.

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She wants to create liberating and purposeful work that brings the emotion of joy and allows anyone experiencing the piece to look at the seemingly haphazard marks and understand its beautiful reason for being there. Shaleen endlessly searches for beauty and reasons to celebrate in each brushstroke. 

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CV:

Exhibitions
2017 Group Exhibition Our Stories, The Gallery at Johnson Ferry, Marietta, GA
2018 Group Exhibition Known, The Gallery at Johnson Ferry, Marietta, GA
2018 Group Exhibition R.A.W. Connect, Atlanta, GA
2021 Group Exhibition Revive, The Gallery at Johnson Ferry, Marietta, GA 
2022 Group Exhibition Yonkers Artists Showcase, Yonkers Arts Project Space, Yonkers, NY
2022 Solo Exhibition This New Life, Sewell Mill Cultural Center Gallery, Marietta, GA 
2022 Group Exhibition Visceral, M.A.D.S. Art Gallery, Milano, Italy (curated by Matilde Della Pina)

2022 Group Exhibition Art Gala Exhibition, Work In Prgress, Inc., Atlanta, GA
2022 Group Exhibition Narratives, Art 4 You Gallery, Dubai, United Arab Emirates (curated by Jesno Jackson)

2023 Group Exhibition I Can Do That, Koncept House, Atlanta, GA (curated by Sakari Sanders)

2024 Group Exhibition Spotlight on Art, Atlanta, GA (Atlanta Decorative Arts Center)

2024 Group Exhibition EmpowerHER: A Celebration of Women in Art, Atlanta, GA (Emma Darnell Aviation Museum)

2024 Solo Exhibition Mono, The Art Station, Kennesaw, GA

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Publications
ISSUE 11, Al-Tiba9 Contemporary Art Magazine, 2022

Bellamonti Art, World Art Guide 2023, 2023

Issue #35, CREATE! Magazine, 2023

Artrepreneur, Orange Book Vol. 2, 2023 

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Awards and Honors
2017 Third Place, The Gallery at Johnson Ferry, Marietta, GA
2018 Honorable Mention, The Gallery at Johnson Ferry, Marietta, GA
2022 Art Residency, Serendipity Labs Inc.-Buckhead, Atlanta, GA

2023 Art Residency, Serendipity Labs Inc.-Perimeter, Atlanta, GA

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Gallery Affiliation
Collective 131 Gallery, Saratoga Springs, NY

RedDot Culture, London, England

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