For more than five decades, Barbara Chase-Riboud has created monumental abstract forms with a deep and nuanced understanding of history, identity, and sense of place. Known for striking sculptures that combine metal and fiber, her work operates on several dichotomies that have become central to her practice: hard/soft, male/female, flexible/inflexible, stable/fluid, figurative/abstract, powerful/delicate. Zanzibar #3 is one of at least six known works in a series named after the East African island in the Indian Ocean that was a hub for the Arab slave trade, which thrived from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. Evocative of an elaborate headdress, Zanzibar #3 was created following Chase-Riboud’s journeys to Egypt, China, Senegal, and Algeria, where she was exposed to the richness of non-Western cultures.

halley k harrisburg, Class of 1990
Director, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York