Full Name Hayv Kahraman Education Umea University Role Artist | Name Hayv Kahraman Nationality Iraqi American | |
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Born 1981 Baghdad, Iraq Known for Painting, Drawing, Sculpture | ||
Hayv kahraman iraqi artist
Hayv Kahraman (born 1981) is an Iraqi artist. She primarily paints, but also sculpts and sketches. Her works reflect the controversial issues of gender, specifically concerning female identity in relation to her experiences as a refugee, and all issues that plague her home country of Iraq. Hayv currently lives and works in California, United States.
Contents
- Hayv kahraman iraqi artist
- Hayv kahraman gtf 2014 award for excellence in cultural creativity
- Life and career
- Her Works
- References
Hayv kahraman gtf 2014 award for excellence in cultural creativity
Life and career
Born in Baghdad, Iraq in 1981. During the Iran War, Hayv spent a lot of her time in the basement of her uncle's house. Her relatives would all huddle around candles and play card games. While living in Iraq, she attended the Music and Ballet School in central Baghdad. One night, her family packed their car and hired a smuggler to take them where it was safe. They had reached the Stockholm Arlanda, the airport in Sweden, and this is when she became a refugee. She then moved to Sweden at the age of 11. She enrolled in music and ballet classes, but decided to leave due to the teacher's racism. She began oil painting at the age of 12 and later had several successful exhibitions in Sweden. She studied at the Academy of Art and Design in Florence, Italy. This is where she met her husband, Anthony Velasquez. Kahraman's artwork depict the effects of war, and how they affect women. Her wide stylistic references range from Japanese and Arabic calligraphy art nouveau, Persian miniature and Greek iconography.
Her Works
War-aq, the Arabic word for playing cards, is a very personal group of her works. She combined the idea of a scattered deck of cards with the experiences of five million displaced Iraqis. Migrant 11 is a series of a contorted dancer that refers to the deformation of the self due to migration. This work relates to her personal experience of attending the music and ballet school in central Baghdad. Migrant 3 is a self portrait of herself cutting off her tongue to represent the loss of language and communication through her life experiences.
