Lahib Jaddo: Artist's Statement

I relate to the universe around me visually so I paint to understand my inner worlds.

My work is about ethnic heritage, place, contemporary life, sexuality, emotions, heroes, ghosts, alternate realities, and nature. It is about the places I’ve seen and the way in which I perceive things. My work is a culmination of trying to make sense of all those elements in a visual language, a language that I weave into story telling.

When I paint, I want to remember a specific moment in time, a moment that I want to depict with beauty, however, my paintings take a long time to execute during which I go through a wide range of emotions. As a result, my painting shows the ebb and flow of my passion. As this materializes on the canvas, many sides come to life. Images of sexuality, depression, elation, flight, suffocation and constrictions surface through figures, landscape, texture, shape, costumes, motion and narration.

I have lived half my life in the old world, the Middle East, and half of it in this new world. My work is a reflection of that mix. I don’t define myself or my art as being one or the other. I am a mix of both worlds as is my work. This reality is both a constant tension and an infinite well of emotion that pushes me to know, to want to know, the multiple sides of things. In this complex arena I weave traditional realistic figurative painting with contemporary iconography to express freedom, beauty and to simply tell my story.

Curriculum Vitae

Fuzuli University Presentation

Citadel of Kirkuk Art Statement

Artwork

Website:

http://lahibjaddo.com