Themes of Fatherland #3: The War Artist

The Iraq Pavilion artist Serwan Baran fought as a soldier during the Iran-Iraq war, and served as a war artist in the first Gulf War. But he dismisses his art work from that period as state-sanctioned propaganda. “We painted in a realistic style but the paintings had nothing to do with the reality that we…
Essay 

Themes of Fatherland #2: The Boat

Serwan Baran’s The Last General (2019), a new commission unveiled at the Iraq Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, depicts the corpse of an army general floating on a reed boat. As visitors enter the Pavilion’s first room they stumble on the clay and resin sculpture. The general’s body appears rested, but his head drops backwards,…
Event, News 

The Iraq Pavilion Opens to the Public

‘Fatherland,’ the Iraq Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale has opened to the public after a busy and exciting week of previews. Visitors at preview tours of the pavilion included representatives of institutions such as the Tate, Art Dubai, the Museum of Modern Art Buenos Aires, the Serpentine and the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and…