Khaled Dawwa (1985) - Museum Beelden aan Zee - NL

Khaled Dawwa

Khaled Dawwa is trained at the art academy in Damascus, where he graduated in 2007. He had to leave Syria due to the war that raged there since 2011, and which ended in late 2024 with Assad's escape. Because of the civil war, Dawwa was forced to flee to Lebanon, where he stayed for a year. He then traveled on to France, as it was also impossible to build a life in Lebanon. In Vanves, near Paris, he was able to set up a studio in 2014, where he still works.

Khaled Dawwa

About his work
A common theme in his work is the corpulent figure, chained to his chair, with a completely perforated or porous exterior. This creates a contradictory effect: the man in his chair is an immovable monolith, but his exterior is pierced, not solid. Dawwa sometimes inflates this type of man to monumental proportions. You can see a commentary on the workings of power in this: the ruler exudes that he is a rock, a natural phenomenon that cannot be moved, but when you get closer, you see the wear and tear of the damaged exterior.

His groups of corpulent figures, demonstrating together (And We Chanted for Freedom, 2011-14), or lying together exhausted or dying among oil barrels, are even more politically charged. The bodies are not idealized. The people are collectively dead tired or trying to resist, but those other old, fat men in their easy chairs who hold the power do not move.