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Lot Essay
Tammam Azzam examines and interpret the ongoing political and social upheaval in Syria. Utilizing digital art, among other techniques in order to express himself, Tammam Azzam can certainly be considered as one of the contemporary revolutionary artists to have emerged from the Middle East and one that his work defines the Syrian crisis since 2011. His works communicate the magnitude of devastation experienced across his native Syria through expressionist compositions of destroyed cityscapes. Navigating his way through the labyrinth of physical and emotional consequences for those who have stayed and those who have escaped their war-torn homeland, Azzam rejects any attempt to over-sentimentalise what has been left behind or what lies ahead, instead he leaves us with the difficult and confronting reality of a country’s ruins.
In 2011, Azzam relocated from Syria to Dubai and recently to Germany but had to unfortunately leave his studio behind. The result of this was series upon series of digital work.
Tackling motifs such as the war on his homeland, Syria, the artist alludes to how the war has affected him not only on a personal level, but on a public one as well. Azzam examines and interprets the ongoing political and social upheaval in Syria. Often experimenting with the application of various media on his canvases, enabling the creation of a “hybrid form”, the present work, Burning Syria, depicts a map of Syria that is burning throughout the canvas. As disgusted as he is inspired by these cycles of violence and destruction, the present work shows the map of the world whereby parts of the country are fractured and wounded. With an ever-evolving method, Tammam Azzam recalls the beauty of his native Syria, rejuvenating its broken pieces with complex techniques.
The bloodshed in Syria inevitably took its toll on the artist and caused a split identity in himself. On one hand, there’s the Syrian; the person who scathes in his criticism of a world that stands idly by, watching the daily horrors occurring in his home country. While on the other hand there’s the artist; the person who blames himself, for his own cowardice, and for making a living out of the situation.
I, The Syrian depicts a young man with his hands locked behind his head and his back to the viewer. Having a contemplative stance the young man’s pose can also be taken in as though he is looking on in disappointment and defeat to something that is out of his control. The artist is placing the audience in the same direction as the subject as to make them feel as though they are looking at the same missile ridden sky. A gust of smoke emerges from the bottom of the image to illustrate that the some of the missiles have already landed. This work is part of a larger collection of digital works that bare the same name and is the result of the aforementioned ‘identity crisis’. Both identities struggle with the contradictory roles, and the work itself is the embodiment of Syrian sorrow.
In 2011, Azzam relocated from Syria to Dubai and recently to Germany but had to unfortunately leave his studio behind. The result of this was series upon series of digital work.
Tackling motifs such as the war on his homeland, Syria, the artist alludes to how the war has affected him not only on a personal level, but on a public one as well. Azzam examines and interprets the ongoing political and social upheaval in Syria. Often experimenting with the application of various media on his canvases, enabling the creation of a “hybrid form”, the present work, Burning Syria, depicts a map of Syria that is burning throughout the canvas. As disgusted as he is inspired by these cycles of violence and destruction, the present work shows the map of the world whereby parts of the country are fractured and wounded. With an ever-evolving method, Tammam Azzam recalls the beauty of his native Syria, rejuvenating its broken pieces with complex techniques.
The bloodshed in Syria inevitably took its toll on the artist and caused a split identity in himself. On one hand, there’s the Syrian; the person who scathes in his criticism of a world that stands idly by, watching the daily horrors occurring in his home country. While on the other hand there’s the artist; the person who blames himself, for his own cowardice, and for making a living out of the situation.
I, The Syrian depicts a young man with his hands locked behind his head and his back to the viewer. Having a contemplative stance the young man’s pose can also be taken in as though he is looking on in disappointment and defeat to something that is out of his control. The artist is placing the audience in the same direction as the subject as to make them feel as though they are looking at the same missile ridden sky. A gust of smoke emerges from the bottom of the image to illustrate that the some of the missiles have already landed. This work is part of a larger collection of digital works that bare the same name and is the result of the aforementioned ‘identity crisis’. Both identities struggle with the contradictory roles, and the work itself is the embodiment of Syrian sorrow.