“Toor’s evocative, tenderly executed paintings begin to pluck at your heartstrings almost as soon as you see them.” –Roberta Smith, New York Times

Known for his moody figurative works that combine academic technique with a quick, sketchlike style, Salman Toor’s paintings depict intimate scenes in the imagined lives of young, queer men residing between New York City and South Asia. As Baltimore Museum of art curator Asma Naeem describes in her introduction, “his paintings resonate as journal-like entries that record moments of kinship, bonding, playfulness, lust, loneliness, rejection—pastel-inflected, gossamer-covered flights of the imagination with wispy Brown boys that mine the complexities of being an immigrant, queer and human.”

This monograph, produced in conjunction with the artist’s first retrospective exhibition, collects Toor’s most essential works alongside significant new texts, by exhibition curator Naeem and writer, editor, and critic Evan Moffitt, that examine the works for both their formal innovations and their influences. Also included is an original new short story by author Hanya Yanagihara, illustrated by Toor’s paintings. Lavishly designed by Topos Graphics, No Ordinary Love is an exquisite introduction to a powerful young talent.

Salman Toor was born in Lahore, Pakistan in 1983 and currently lives and works in New York. He studied painting and drawing at Ohio Wesleyan University and received his MFA from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY. Salman Toor: How Will I Know, the artist’s first institutional solo exhibition, was recently presented at the Whitney Museum (2020–21).