Artist Jordan Nassar’s fourth solo exhibition at James Cohan Gallery in NYC, titled REVELATION, presented a breathtaking and deeply considered exploration of heritage, history, and inherited nostalgia. The show featured expansive new works in two distinct mediums, hand-embroidery and glass mosaic, that both honor and reimagine traditional craft techniques. The title itself, inspired by Etel Adnan's epic poem The Arab Apocalypse, is a nod to the Greek word apokaluptein, meaning "to uncover" or "to reveal." This theme of unveiling resonated powerfully throughout the collection, as Nassar skillfully peeled back layers of history to question the narratives they hold.
Nassar’s intricate, hand-embroidered works served as poignant meditations on landscape, color, and light. Created through a vital collaboration with Palestinian craftswomen in Bethlehem, Ramallah, and Hebron, these pieces feature dense, hypnotic walls of geometric patterning that extend across the entire canvas. This meticulous stitching, a hallmark of Palestinian embroidery, functions as both a frame and a veil. It often obscures or provides a carefully constructed window into brilliantly hued, imagined vistas, creating a dynamic interplay between concealment and discovery.
The shadowy palettes in many pieces reflect a "somber reverence," one that is punctuated by surprising moments of brightness. In a standout work, Between Two Hedges of Silence, 2025, shades of gray give way to a valley illuminated by a glowing crimson sun. This act of revealing what lies beyond from multiple vantage points grants viewers a glimpse into a world that is both personal and universal, rooted in history yet vividly imagined.
The exhibition also featured stunning mosaics that echoed the grandeur of Byzantine ruins. Using the ancient method of hand-cutting glass, Nassar reconstructed two specific archaeological antiquities, an act he describes as a "tender gesture." The original artifacts are displayed as welcome markers in the arrivals corridor at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, a context that loads them with political and cultural significance.
In his reinterpretation, Nassar engages in a delicate dance of preservation and intervention. For a fragment of a 5th-6th century floor from BethLehem of the Galilee, he mirrors its original design but also asserts his own aesthetic choices, filling in eroded areas with exotic animals and curving grape vines. In another major piece, Bisan (Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed shalt thou be when thou goest out) (Deuteronomy 28:6), 2025, Nassar reinterprets a historical mosaic from the city of Bisan. He makes a key, symbolic alteration: he has unbridled the birds of the ribbons that were tied around their napes in the original, a quiet but powerful gesture of liberation.
Through these acts of recreation and reinterpretation, Nassar reframed their historical lineage. REVELATION was a profound invitation to see the past within a contemporary site, questioning the implicit power that ruins project and the complex narratives they can be used to construct and uphold. Jordan Nassar masterfully used the familiar language of craft to ask urgent questions about symbolism and history, proving how ancient techniques can reveal entirely new and necessary perspectives.
Interested in works by Jordan Nassar?
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