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Ali Kaaf ’s paintings, photographs, and films are interconnected by conceptual processes and internal structures that communicate with one another. In his artistic language, he ties together personal worlds of life between Syria, Beirut, and Berlin, where he studied under Marwan and Rebecca Horn at the College of Arts.
His work seems primal and archaic, to which the use of the elements, such as fire, contributes. However, it also allows for a very contemporary political reading. It is a game of codes, archetypes, and symbols that ultimately results in the questioning of their arbitrariness. The goal is to question the form, as well as the appropriation and reception of its power.
For painting, the concentrated use of black as a color – or more specifically as an artistic working material in the form of charcoal, pigment, soot, ink, and graphite – means an irrevocable occupation of the surface without free space for pentimento. Ali Kaaf ’s approach goes beyond the surface into space: a black figure is painstakingly processed with a gleaming graphite stick, producing diverse structures..."
Selected text from "Dramaturgy of Signs" by Alexandra von Stosch
(Pressetext)
Künstler Ali Kaaf
