Born in 1965 in Ahwaz, Iran
Lives and works in Jersey City, NJ
Education
1987 BA with Honors, Fine Art/Painting, Canterbury College of Art
Awards and Collections
2022 Acquisition: Permanent Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum, CA
2022 Yaddo Fellowship, Saratoga Springs, NY
2018 Nomination: Anonymous Was A Woman Award
2018 New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Painting fellowship
2016 -17 Byrdcliffe Summer Resident Program - Woodstock, NY
2016 Acquisition: Grey Art Gallery, New York University Collection
2016 Fellowship: Saltonstall Foundation, Ithaca, NY
2014 The Pollock-Krasner Foundation Award
2013 Acquisition: Permanent Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY
2012 University of Virginia: Artist in residence fellow, Virginia
2011 Acquisition: Omid Foundation, Tehran, Iran
2010 Joan Mitchell Foundation Award for Painting/Sculpture, NY NY
2010 Acquisition: The Burger Collection, Hong Kong
2009 Acquisition: The Farjaam Art Collection, Dubai, UAE
2008 Acquisition: Permanent Collection of the British Museum, UK
2008 Acquisition: The Donald Rubin Foundation (Rubin Museum) NY NY
2008 Acquisition: The Devi Foundation, India
2007 New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Fellowship
2006 Yaddo Fellowship, Saratoga Springs, NY
2002 Acquisition: Permanent Collection of the British Government, UK
1997 M&G Purchase Prize – Royal Academy of Art, London, UK
Samira Abbassy was born in Ahwaz, Iran in 1965 and moved to London, UK as a child. After graduating from Canterbury College of Art, she began showing in London. She moved to New York in 1998, where she helped to set up the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, and the EFA Studio Center.
Her work has been included in shows at the Metropolitan and the British Museum and is in private and public collections worldwide, including the Metropolitan Museum, British Museum, the British Government Art Collection, the Grey Art Gallery at NYU, the Burger Collection, the Donald Rubin collection (Rubin Museum, NY), the Farjaam Collection, Dubai, the Los Angeles County Museum and the Afkhami Collection.
During Abbassy’s thirty-year career, her work has been the subject of twenty gallery solo shows in London, Dubai, and New York. Her fellowships include the Yaddo fellowship in 2006 and 2022 and Saltonstall in 2017. She has been awarded two NYFA awards in 2007 and 2018, a Joan Mitchell award in 2010, and a Pollock-Krasner in 2014. Abbassy was also nominated for the Anonymous Was a Woman award in 2018.
In 2019 her work was included in the 26th Venice Biennial presented by Heist gallery London. Abbassy has also worked as an educator in many educational institutions in the UK and the USA, some of which are: Hunter College, Penn State, and the University of Virginia, where she was the artist in Residence in April 2012. In 2023 her work will be included in Women Defining Women in Contemporary Art in the Middle East and Beyond, Curated by Linda Komaroff, Los Angeles County Museum.
