Hassan Sharif: I Am The Single Work Artist

Hassan's Atelier

Everything in this room is exactly as Hassan left it in his workshop and studio. 

Hassan's Atelier

His shelves were full of detritus that would either stay put for years or one day make it into an artwork.

Email, 2009

Mixed media, variable dimensions. Homage to Jos Clevers. Courtesy of Hassan Sharif Estate.

Man and Mountain No.4, 2009

Oil on canvas, 200x145cm. Courtesy of Hassan Sharif Estate.

An oversized spool of wire. One of the many large-scale installations placed around the public areas of the Sharjah Art Foundation.

Seven Points Angular Lines - Part 8, 2013

Ink and pencil on paper; acrylic on canvas. 59.5x42cm; 60x30cm. Courtesy of Hassan Sharif Estate.

A lovely combination of drawing and painting from Sharif's semi-system work. 

... so I created a semi system

Installation view of Gallery 1, ... so I created a semi system. Sharif's obsessed with rules and breaking them is summarised in this room

Wave-Like and Semistraight Horizontal Lines, 2006

Ink and pencil on paper. 29.5x21cm each. Sharjah Art Foundation Collection.

Colourful File No.2, 2006

Plastic cover, jute, paper and cloth. 31x25x11.9cm. Sharjah Art Foundation Collection. 

This was displayed in the gallery titled My Little Tiny Box - a reference to Sharif's many compulsive collections. 

Gallery 2: My Little Tiny Box

Installation view. Sharif's sewing notebooks and several other pieces made of paper and other printed matter on display in the Sharjah Art Foundation, Gallery 2.

Another of Sharif's large public installations inside the Sharjah Art Foundation spaces.

Gallery 3: I'm loyal to colour

Installation view inside Gallery 3, the space dedicated to Sharif's largest and most colourful works. 

Slippers and Wire, 2009 (detail)

Slippers and copper wire, dimensions variable. Courtesy of Hassan Sharif Estate.

Gallery 5: I'm an object maker

Some of Sharif's monumental works appear in this gallery space. Shown here in the foreground is 555, (2016) ; aluminium plates and copper wire, 320x320x240cm. Courtesy of Hassan Sharif Estate; and Broom, (2016), broom and copper wire; 1070x315x10 cm. Courtesy of Hassan Sharif Estate. 

Compartmentalised items from Sharif's vast oeuvre display how he was attracted to the sheer volume of things that we fill our lives with

Doorways

These doors, taken from Sharif's home studio are filled with more objects from his collection and act as a divider between two rooms inside Bait Al Serkal. 

• In the slideshow, all images taken by Anna Seaman in January 2018 in Hassan Sharif: I am the Single Work Artist exhibition at Sharjah Art Foundation

It is only when you step foot into the massive Hassan Sharif's retrospective at Sharjah Art Foundation that the significance of the title is underlined. I Am The Single Work Artist is a vast exhibition, taking over all the art spaces of the foundation and spilling over into Bait Al Serkal. For those who have never been, that is at least room for seven big solo exhibitions and that is not counting the large installations also placed in public areas. Yet, as diverse and large as Sharif's oeuvre was, he insisted that he was a "single work artist", meaning that he had only one focal point and spent his entire life working towards it. 

Traversing the many halls of the exhibitions, which are named after further snippets of the artist's speech: Performance is good; I'm loyal to colour; ... so I created a semi system; I'm an object maker - the sheer quantity of the work Sharif produced is clear, as is his dedication to his practice. My personal favourites, the semi systems and the colour room contain some of his most famous work. A large and looming mound of plastic slippers summarises his obsession with consumerism and how the world around him seemed to go crazy as mass-production took over our lives and created an insatiable need. His semi systems acknowledge the fluidity of seemingly rigid structures in his social and political surroundings and also reveal his rebellious side: Hassan certainly followed his own rules.

A special highlight of the entire show, curated by Sheikha Hoor Al Qasimi, director of the Sharjah Art Foundation, is the reconstruction of Hassan's studio. I was lucky enough to visit him at his home atelier and walking into that room, into which the desk, sketchbooks, piles of detritus / artworks in preparation and even cigarettes and ashtray were transplanted straight from his home, was a wonderful moment of reflection and remembrance of a life well lived and a practice to be treasured long into the future.

• Hassan Sharif: I Am The Single Work Artist. November 4, 2017 - February 3, 2018. Sharjah Art Foundation.