Nima Nabavi: Sunrise at the Vortex

Sunrise at the Vortex is the second solo exhibition by Nima Nabavi at The Third Line. Featuring a selection of new works made by the artist between 2022 and 2025, the show marks a significant evolution in his practice, both conceptually and technically. Rooted in his travels to sites across the world considered to be energy centers by different communities, the works reflect Nabavi’s deepened commitment to introspection, geometry, and modes of making that embrace technology alongside traditional tools.

I.W.: Roswell2223 (2023) was drawn meticulously over the course of a year. Could you describe the process of conceiving and executing this piece? You also worked on the piece while it was on view at the Roswell Museum in New Mexico, the United States, so that visitors could observe your process and speak with you. What did this experience teach you about your practice, yourself, and/or the world?

N.N.: My residency at Roswell marked the first time I had access to a standalone studio. Until then, I had always just worked on a kitchen table in my living room, which naturally limited the scale of my work. I arrived at Roswell without a specific plan, but when I saw the size of the space and the timespan of the program sunk in, I started thinking about making a single piece that would take up all of the space and time I had been gifted. I bought the largest roll of canvas I could find (18 feet by 6 feet), the biggest ruler I could find (9 feet long), and hundreds of markers in 17 colors. I then rolled out the canvas on the floor and started working on the piece line by line.

I.W.: It seems intuition plays an important role in the making of your pieces. Could you expand upon this aspect a little more?

N.N.: The type of work I make has infinite potential start and end points, so knowing where to begin and when I’m done is always a challenge. Usually, I commence at a point of curiosity that emerged while making a previous artwork. It’s hard to fully visualize what the work will look like at the outset. As I continue, I reach a point where something other than what I planned starts speaking to me. Once a piece is in motion, it gains its own momentum—it can veer into a clear direction, or it might require sitting with it, figuring out where it wants to go. If that pull is strong enough, I follow it. With Roswell2223 (2023) for instance, I kept a ladder beside the canvas and would climb up to gaze into the piece from above, often for an hour at a time. I tried to understand where it wanted to go next—what felt right and comfortable for the piece.  As for knowing when a piece is finished, I rely on this feeling—like reaching the end of a story. That’s when I know its work is complete.

And so I started experimenting with pen-plotters. When I first saw one, I instantly knew that I could incorporate it in my practice. It’s a very simple machine in its design; it holds a pen and draws one line at a time according your instructions. It felt like a studio assistant that actually spoke my visual language. To work with a pen-plotter, I draw the work on the computer first in the same way I would on paper, convert the drawings into layers of color, convert the layers into code, and then send that information to the pen-plotter to execute. The process turned out to be much more complex and time-consuming than just drawing the works myself, also because it introduced a huge chunk of error-prone unpredictability. However, it unlocked deeper dimensions in my work, not to mention that it freed me from the physical pain of manual drawing. With the pen-plotter, I can introduce curved lines, dots, and new angles in my works. I can layer my works in deeper saturations than ever before and experiment multiple color combinations.

I’ve also been revisiting digital animation recently. Digital work has always been a part of my practice; my first solo show at The Third Line, 1,2,3 (2018), included a digital animation. Last month, I was invited by Jameel Arts Centre to create a digital animation that would be projection-mapped onto a facade of their building. At Sunrise at the Vortex, I’m presenting The Pull of The Pulse (2025), my most complex animation to date, featuring 360 frames that I drew digitally. It has a meditative and transformative appeal, inviting people to spend time with it. These types of works ask people to interact with them in a totally different way than with a framed painting, and I love that I can use different mediums to connect with people.

I have all of these ideas inside me that I want to put out into the world, but my time on earth is finite. I’m committed to using whatever tools I can, whether they are traditional or technological, to bring these artworks to life. The most important part is that the work gets done and people get to see it. Methodology doesn’t define my practice—I will never make work in a way that is more difficult than it needs to be, and I will never undercut what the work requires either. I want to bring these things to life in their fullest and most honest manifestations.