About his work:
With a work rather difficult to classify, Ara Azad is a multicultural traveler and practitioner, with a body of interconnected practices that reflect not only his background but also the itinerant nature of his project In 1995, he embarked on the still ongoing project, Postal Paintings, triggered by his curiosity about the limits of trust and human experience. The artist painted canvas that were mailed unwrapped and exposed to atmospheric conditions, so that they would bear traces of their journey, creating a space of possibility for human trust and communication. Expanding the theoretical limits of painting, sculpture, drawing and installation, he collapsed them into each other with topographical precision but yet at a blurred margin, at an interstice where transformation is ceaseless. His mailed paintings were included in the Liverpool Biennial and as a performer, he remains very concerned with the articulation of an artistic practice where social issues and aesthetics convene on the public domain, where as an art educator, Azad has attempted to convey the same message of synthesis and crossing borders that echoes throughout his work.
Biography:
Ara Azad was born in Beirut in 1962 and is based in Boston since 1982. He holds degrees from The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, and the Institute for Global Leadership at Tufts University. Azad is involved in art education in Germany, Bahrain and Lebanon, and a lecturer in fine art, he is the former (1996-98) representative of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts. His work spans across painting, sculpture, site-specific installations and performance.With Galerie Janine Rubeiz, he held the solo exhibition “Aspérité(s)” (2010), and his work has been showcased in Art Dubai(2010). His work is permanently exhibited at Galerie Janine Rubeiz, Beirut.
