Diana Al-Hadid: unbecoming

MSU Broad Art Museum

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November 5, 2024

Diana Al-Hadid, Spun of the Limits of my Lonely Waltz, 2006 © Diana Al-Hadid.

The Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University (MSU Broad Art Museum) is thrilled to announce the upcoming survey exhibition unbecoming by Diana Al-Hadid that questions how constructions of femininity take form over time, a development that can be understood in part by thinking through Al-Hadid’s research and artistic process.

Based in New York, Al-Hadid works prolifically between painting, sculpture, and more recently, handmade paper. Born in Syria in 1981, Al-Hadid moved to the United States as a child. She grew up in Ohio, earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Kent State University, and a Master of Fine Arts from Virginia Commonwealth University. Al-Hadid’s work draws on diverse sources ranging from art history to Greek mythology, and global literature. Her visual language emerges from an astute sense of materiality that culminates in specific abstractions; these works defy how we think about both materials and sculpture and in turn, work to unravel the ways of thinking we may see as “normal.”

“Since Al-Hadid completed her MFA, questions of gender and womanhood have been central themes within her artistic practice,” commented Dr. Rachel Winter, assistant curator at the MSU Broad Art Museum and curator of unbecoming. “Specifically, this survey attends to the ways that the artist is constantly subverting our expectations about materials and form, but it also uses this approach to question the ideologies held in society, works of art, and literary references. I’m thrilled for the opportunity to explore this aspect of her work in detail by looking at her first large-scale sculptural work Spun of the Limits of My Lonely Waltz, as well as a series of new works on paper that will make their debut in this exhibition, and numerous paintings and sculptures across nearly two decades of work.”
Opening in June 2025, the exhibition invites us to look closely and consider how the materials in the artist’s work both break down and accumulate into their final form. In turn, we are prompted to reflect on how expectations about womanhood and femininity are similarly constructed but they can also be deconstructed to imagine different futures.

“The MSU Broad Art Museum has increasingly been focused on the role of the Midwest in shaping larger narratives in the arts and contributions to culture more broadly. In partnership with Diana through this exhibition, we continue this work while highlighting one of the most significant artists working today,” said Steven L. Bridges, interim director of the museum. “We’re very proud to present the artist’s first solo exhibition in Michigan, which brings forward important and timely conversations around notions of femininity and womxnhood, while also celebrating her roots.”

Al-Hadid’s reworking of materials and form is a process that models how we can similarly transform the social expectations about womanhood and women’s behavior to instead find the power in being “unbecoming.”

unbecoming (Jun. 7–Dec. 21, 2025) is organized by the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University and curated by Dr. Rachel Winter, Assistant Curator, with support from Laine Lord, Curatorial Support. Support for this exhibition is provided by the Eli and Edythe Broad Endowed Exhibitions Fund. Special thanks to Kasmin Gallery, New York, and Dieu Donné. Dieu Donné is the leading non-profit cultural institution dedicated to serving emerging and established artists through the collaborative creation of contemporary art using the process of hand papermaking.

Dieu Donné is the leading non-profit cultural institution dedicated to serving emerging and established artists through the collaborative creation of contemporary art using the process of hand papermaking. Since 1976, Dieu Donné has introduced artists to the untapped potential of hand papermaking as an art medium. Through extensive collaborations with Master Papermakers, Dieu Donné works with artists from a wide variety of practices to explore the creative possibilities in hand papermaking – fostering experimentation and producing innovative works of art. Dieu Donné strives to teach a new visual language, providing a transformative experience that often leads to artistic breakthroughs.
About the MSU Broad Art Museum

Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University, designed by Zaha Hadid, East Lansing, Michigan.

The Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University (MSU Broad Art Museum) connects people with art through experiences that inspire curiosity and inquiry. Presenting exhibitions and programs that engage diverse communities around issues of local relevance and global significance, the MSU Broad Art Museum advances the university values of quality, inclusion, and connectivity. Opened on November 10, 2012, the museum was designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid and named in honor of Eli and Edythe Broad, longtime supporters of the university who provided the lead gift for its creation.

Michigan State University has been working to advance the common good in uncommon ways for more than 150 years. One of the top research universities in the world, MSU focuses its vast resources on creating solutions to some of the world’s most pressing challenges, while providing life-changing opportunities to a diverse and inclusive academic

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About the Artist

Portrait by Charlie Rubin.

Diana Al-Hadid

Diana Al-Hadid examines the historical frameworks and perspectives that continue to shape discourse on culture and materials today. With a practice spanning sculpture, wall reliefs, and works on paper, the artist weaves together enigmatic narratives that draw inspiration from both ancient and modern civilizations. Al-Hadid’s rich allegorical constructions are born from art historical religious imagery, ancient manuscripts, female archetypes, and folkloric storytelling frameworks.

Framed by a host of references from antiquity, cosmology, cartography, and architecture, Al-Hadid’s work gives form to ghostly images abstractly rendered in materials as various as steel, polymer gypsum, fiberglass, wood, foam, plaster, aluminum foil, and pigment. The artist’s process-based explorations innovate from commonplace industrial materials. Their formidable presence sits steady in the lineage of creation and construction that we associate with empire, complicated by an often-elegiac tone.

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