Some things just don't have a silver lining. War is one of those things. It's not just difficult, but also irresponsible, to find consolation in times of death and destruction. But while war has no bright side, it does have art. Art that is an act of resistance against the silence that war creates. Art that transcends speech when generations become lost to destruction and displacement.
Few things express this situation as powerfully as Picasso's Guernica:
The Syrian war, as we all know too well, has been one of the bloodiest of the 21st century. It has bred the biggest refugee crisis since World War II, and the ever-climbing death toll conjures images of a Syria covered in brushstrokes of blood red. The pain immense, and the realties practically inconceivable, a battalion of Syrian artists have taken on the daunting task of rendering multilayered personal and collective pains on canvas. Some are well-known to the art world, others get less attention than they deserve. Here, we want to shed light on a few up-and-coming ones we think you should look out for. Remember their names!
When Tammam Azzam photoshopped Klimt's famous painting The Kiss on a bombed building, the image went viral. It was one of many others that awkwardly integrated identifiable paintings into a war-ravaged landscape. The superimposition, he said, was meant " to draw attention to the tragedy."
“I chose it as an icon of love, a way of looking for the stories of love behind this wall that was completely obliterated by the machinery of war,” he said.
Azzam's exhibition portfolio boasts solo exhibits and biennnales; one of his most prominent is at Banksy's newest show, and first "bemusement park", Dismaland.
He is 36 years old, and you should expect to see much more of him.
Dima is an artist through and through. And by that, we mean that she is the personification of art as a living breathing thing. Her illustrations about life in exile express not only her longing for a war-torn homeland, but her ongoing relationship with it. Dima is also a social activist and has spent time clowning for disenfranchized kids (she says she also does this as a form of therapy).
"Despite the fluidity and instability of her existence in the past half-decade or so, Dima’s commitment to art and to her homeland are inseparable and have never wavered," writes journalist Zahra Hankir.
Here is Dima's interview with Reuters on her contributions to British Red Cross project, "Postcards For Syria."
Based in Beirut, Khayata is quickly becoming one of the city's most preeminent artists. This in spite of widespread prejudice against the country's Syrian refugees. His paintings depict loose embroidery, craned necks of unsightly characters. It is a Syria that is out of sorts, a Syria that he wants to "stitch back together."
Most recently he exhibited on the streets of Leicester, England where his framed photographs hung prominently from the sides of buildings. Khayata was refused a visa by the UK government to attend his own exhibition, a reminder that the support we often see from Western governments for Syrian artists can be little more than lip service.
Wael Toubaji is the animator of a fantastic comic series on The Guardian portraying the hardships of Syrians from the start of the uprisings in 2011 to their nearly inevitable escape to Europe. It's a powerful and poignant depiction of the perils that the average Syrian has faced over the past six years. Benjamin Dix created the comics that Toubaji animated, and they were illustrated by Lindsay Pollock.
We expect Toubaji's innovative animation style to get even more attention and show up on other important platforms soon. You can see more of his work here.