Interview: Max Emadi

August 23rd, 2007 by Menachem Wecker

I interviewed Max Emadi (see his site here) about his work, primarily his Islamic Erotica series, for my recent pieces on contemporary Islamic art. Here’s one selection from his biography, “After becoming secure in his career as a psychotherapist and beginning his current job for the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health, as well as joining the adjunct faculty at Mount San Antonio College, he decided to revisit the artistic interests of his teens.” He spoke about atheism, President Bush as the emperor with no clothes, and responses to his work.

MW: In a statement on “Islamic Erotica” on your site, you write that nudes are taboo in the Islamic tradition. In your view, to what extent have Muslim artists historically respected Islamic laws? To what extent does Islamic law also forbid figurative art?
ME: I don’t by any means consider myself an authority on Islamic art. I think that artists from Islamic countries have challenge tradition historically like most artist. Persian miniature is a wonderful example. In many ways I think challenging/exposing social norms is an artists natural tendency.

I come from Iran which is basically a Theocracy. I don’t support Theocracies. They enforce their interpretation of Islamic law as strictly as they can although most of the population lives more liberally in secret. My Islamic Erotica series is a partial reaction to this fundamentalism. But it also is a comment on western sexism as well by referencing the tradition of “pinup” art.

MW: You write that for the first time you stopped avoiding referring to your heritage in this series. How did that play out for you? What kind of feedback did you receive from family and friends?
ME: Well it is funny to me how many people reacted to the “Islamic Erotica” series as well as the “Terrorist” series by encouraging me to fear for my life!

I am not famous and reach a limited audience…

I have received a few critical emails through the years but mostly people are complimentary. I believe there to be a great divide between a person who is offended by a work of art, from a kind of person that makes threats for being offended, to the kind of person (small minority) who uses violence to express themselves. If I thought about what “could” happen all the time I would only paint flowers and trees…

At the same time I am not naive. I realize that living in the United states keeps me insulated from a lot of reactions that I may have gotten if I lived in Europe or Asia. The only fundamentalists I have to worry about here are Christians!

MW: How important is the social (and religious) message of your work compared with the artistic decisions?
ME: Well, the last few years my art has been more political. I do try to keep it grounded in art history though. Whether it’s referenced to “pinup” art or the history of portraiture by referencing David’s Napoleon in my Bin Laden painting; or Kim Jung Ill painted in the manner of Warhol’s Mao; I am definitely influenced by western art tradition.

MW: I see you have had a very interesting career, often away from the arts. To what extent, if any, have you found that multi-disciplinary resume and set of experiences to surface in your art?
ME: I guess the same desire to address social injustice which is the root of my profession as a social worker is also present in my work as an artist. I hadn’t really thought about that one and connected the two… a very revealing question for me, thank you!

MW: How did “J.C. (From the “Hero Worship” Series)” come about? What is the Hero Worship series?
ME: The Hero Worship series is currently abandoned. I completed a few paintings and got onto the Terrorist series instead. It was going to be about Celebrity Juxtaposed against religious figures. I completed Pope Benedict, The Dalai Lama, and Jesus but couldn’t get myself to do the celebrities…

MW: Your depiction of Pres. Bush naked in the oval office is very provocative. Do you view his nakedness as a weakness/helplessness? Exhibitionism?
ME: Yea, I’m really proud of that one. I wanted to be provocative. It is a little too obvious maybe but some ideas just have to be done, “The Emperors new cloths” … It means all that you said and notice how happy he is and innocent looking. No guilt in that face! And quite attractive too wouldn’t you say? I wanted it to have a homo-erotic dimension to it just to give it another kind of edge.

MW: How did Terrorism & Freedom Fighters come about? What do the terms mean to you? Are you afraid to create this sort of art given the political climate?
ME: Well it’s like Collin Powell said: “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.”

It all started for me around the time Bush started talking about the “Axis of Evil”. Like most thinking people, the idea of our administration reducing the world to two sides,”with us or against us” after September 11th infuriated me. The series “Terrorists & Freedom Fighters” was the result.

As far as the political climate…

I’m probably on a couple of Government lists as a subversive from way back! I don’t worry about that too much. For practical day to day stuff though, I live in a “blue” state so I don’t get too much flack for being anti-war liberal. Besides, the political climate in the U.S. is improving as the error of our president’s ways are becoming too hard for even the densest of the zealots to ignore!

MW: I find “Virgin No.71″ quite fascinating. The virgin covers her face modestly, but reveals high heals, a lot of leg and heavy firepower. Is this a critique of the virgin reward? A suggestion that the reward is of this world and dangerous?
ME: I Couldn’t have said it better myself. You really understand that piece. I am pleased.

MW: What does it mean to paint Mohammad Atta’s portrait? Is it hard to focus on the art given the enormity of the politics? How do you respond to the viewers who say that in depicting him you glorify him?
ME: That painting was the one I was most worried about showing. He is after all the most obvious “killer” in the bunch although in my mind I think of all the players in this series as involved in murders in one way or another. I think the Atta painting had to be exhibited with the other paintings and not alone. In context I think it is less incendiary.

MW: How does the Peanuts cartoon fit into the series? Is Peanuts a freedom fighter or terrorist?
ME: The “Relax I’ts Ali…” is a painting of Imam Ali, the first Khalif of the Shiites. It was a reaction to the Muslim communities explosion over the Mohammed cartoons. The choice of the comics page of the newspaper used was just random…

MW: In depicting Muslim women in Marilyn poses, do you view the pieces as going both ways? What does Marilyn have to inform us about Islam? Islam about Marilyn?
ME: I am very proud of that painting “God Is Great”. In my mind it falls under the category again of “some subjects just have to be done”! The Islamic Erotica series is all about East meats West as the result of our “war on terror”. I am showing a nightmarish vision of the future in which we have a an unlikely morphing of sexism from both cultures.

MW: You’ve got a very different touch in your abstract work, softer perhaps, where the figurative work is more illustrative. How differently do you approach the two? Do you see any overlap? And I can’t resist: What is the story behind ‘God Is A Chocolate Squirrel’?
ME: I started painting 10 years ago by experimenting with pure abstraction influenced by Abstract Expressionism. My abstract work these days is still loose but more expressionistic & it usually references nature in some way. I have to do some work that is a bit more marketable otherwise I couldn’t afford to keep my painting going.

“God Is a Chocolate Squirrel” was the follow up to “God Is a Chocolate Bunny”!

My wife actually came up with those titles. The paintings were influenced by Mark Rothko who described his paintings as spiritual. Since I’m an atheist and somewhat anti-religion, I had to be a smart ass about it.

MW: ‘Good & Evil; The Game’ is clearly referencing Johns. What other inspirations do you have? Of the four you depict, is it so clear who is good and evil?
ME: Yes that one is an homage to Jasper Johns. In my twisted mind it is a Dart game where the figures in Blue depict our versions of Evil (painted right around Michael Jackson’s arrest on molestation charges) and the yellow figures are our versions of who is good…

Of course whether all the characters are clearly good or evil is somewhat ambiguous which is part of the point of the work.

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