Born in Pakistan in 1983, Salman Toor emigrated to the United States in 2002, becoming a US citizen in 2019. In 2020–21, he had an exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art, How Will I Know. This was followed in 2022 by the solo exhibition No Ordinary Love, organised by the Baltimore Museum of Art and subsequently shown at other American museums. The current presentation of his paintings at the Courtauld Gallery provides a welcome opportunity for British audiences to become acquainted with his work, which explores the relationship between individual identity and the communities to which we belong. Family, friendship, race, nationality, sexuality and artistic tradition all contribute to the ways in which identity is formed and presented, but beyond these overlapping affiliations lies the elusive individual, whose sense of self cannot simply be defined by them. Yet we remain somehow distanced from the very contexts that help shape us, and Toor’s paintings leave us uncertain about our relationship to them. His figures, with their elongated proportions and cartoon-like features, are immediately recognisable, but their stylisation creates a curious detachment. Even when they interact, their relationships remain ambiguous. In the intimacy of Pillow Fight (2022) and Three Friends in a Cab (2021), there is a distance not only between the figures and the viewer but perhaps between the figures themselves. In The Women (2021), the little boy seems absorbed in his own preoccupations, despite the group around him. Toor’s figures rarely meet our eyes, leaving us to observe their encounters almost as voyeurs, unable to penetrate their private worlds. This ambiguity is particularly evident in The Joke (2024). The waiter’s impassive expression gives little away, but the apparent detachment extends to the diners, whose proximity does not necessarily imply connection. Toor’s treatment of his subjects reinforces this uncertainty. The green tones that frequently suffuse his paintings create an intense, sometimes eerie atmosphere. Rather than inviting uncomplicated intimacy, the colour seems to place a veil between us and the scenes we observe. Toor has said that green is, “most importantly ... not a sentimental color”. Its unsettling effect is especially striking in The Bar on East 13th (2019), which reimagines Édouard Manet’s A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (1882). This reference to a celebrated work of European painting places Toor in dialogue with an artistic tradition that he both inherits and transforms, but the distinctive palette makes the familiar seem strangely elusive. The relationship between looking and belonging becomes more explicitly charged in Man with Face Creams and Phone Plug (2019). We may identify with the individual at the border, seeking entry into an unfamiliar place, but the painting also places us in the position of the border guard, scrutinising someone who wishes to cross. Our perspective is no longer secure: we can occupy either position, depending on where we stand. The distinction between insider and outsider becomes a question not only of the artist’s experience but of our own assumptions about ourselves and the contexts that inform our sense of self. Toor’s paintings invite us to look closely at our apparent places of belonging, prompting us to question the assumptions through which we create a sense of self. The figures may remain enigmatic and their relationships unresolved, but that uncertainty gives the work its force, turning the search for belonging into a question that reaches beyond the artist’s own experience to implicate us all.
Rated: ★★★★
Reviewed by J.C.
Image: Salman Toor (b.1983), The Bar on East 13th, 2019. Collection of Keith Fox and Tom Keyes © Salman Toor; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and Thomas Dane Gallery. Photo: Genevieve Hanson
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