Discipline: visual arts

zahra buali

Painter, printmaker, sculptor, and ceramist. From the figurative to the abstract, to the mixed media, she works with a multi-layered approach. Zahra is of Arabian/Persian origin and lives and works in Tiohtià:ke/Montréal. She is the founder of Atelier Inana, where she continues to create and teach art. She holds a BFA. from Concordia University 1996, Montreal, Canada, and a B.Sc. from the University of Arizona, 1983, Tucson, Arizona, U.S.A.. She combines mediums and techniques, challenges boundaries, and superimposes layers of form, color, and space. Her work is strongly linked to her constant search for identity, cultural history, and influences. Her artwork is exhibited locally and internationally and is part of public & private collections in Bahrain, Canada, China, Egypt, Iran, France, the K.S.A., Spain, U.A.E., the U.S.A., and the United Kingdom. Some partial list: Shen Zhen Print Museum, Shen Zhen, China, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Alexandria, Egypt., Almansouria Foundation, Jeddah, K.S.A., & Hozeh Honari, Tehran, Iran.

Zahra participated in various International artist’s residencies, and workshops in Canada, the U.S.A., Spain, China, Jordan, Iran,Bahrain and K.S.A. Her project will consist of 16 works of art and a video installation, around the theme of displacement and re-rooting. At its center are two triptychs: a 3-panel mixed-media mural triptych, and a mixed-media ceramic triptych. The additional 14 pieces are mixed media and paintings, that vary in size from (40 x54cm) to (212 x 102cm). The video, approximately 5-8 minutes, will take the viewer on a visceral journey through the process of destruction of created artwork and re-creation from destruction. 

marc-alain félix

Marc-Alain Félix is a Canadian painter of Haitian origin, living in Tiohtià:ke/Montréal. The artist’s favorite subject is the human being. Through his work, he explores relationships, as well as the issues of our society. He also describes the impact of the influences of popular culture on our daily lives. In his work, he uses bright colors and outrageous strokes. He paints on impulse with an intuitive approach. His work is a fusion of figurative and abstract art, which reflects his imagination and his perceptions of our times. Marc-Alain wants to convey feelings to the public, he wants to give them something to look at that they will remember. Sometimes disproportionate and dynamic, in order to give them a greater expressive intensity, the characters are placed in the foreground in his works. Navigating between reality and imagination, he makes his paintings speak through signs and symbols.

As part of the Alliance program, Marc-Alain Félix aims to improve his communication plan in order to create significant links with future collaborators, such as gallery managers, and curators. In addition, he will be accompanied by the MAI team and a network of partners for project writing and for professional development in the visual arts milieu.

Photo credits: @noiremouliom

jongwook park

Jongwook Park, a settler artist from South Korea, approaches drawing as a fundamental tool of his practice. By using it as his voice, while processing pictorial elements from various cultural references such as Korean Folk paintings and graphic novels, he attempts to discover the unique treatment of line drawing for his works within flat, dimensional, and moving formats. His work has been presented in exhibitions and publications in Canada, the United States, Finland, South Korea, and Japan. He will have a solo exhibition at the Maison de la culture de Pointe-aux-Trembles in March 2023, in Montreal. His project Breathing Words is about developing handcrafting skills with clay to create a series of ceramic sculptures that will be covered with scattered words and imagery. Through symbolic forms, he wants to explore conditions of emotional displacement and create a surreal landscape to evade negative feelings.

reihan ebrahimi

Reihan Ebrahimi is an Iranian-born ceramic artist based in Tiohtiá:ke/ Montreal. She moved to Canada in 2015 and received her BFA in ceramics in 2020 from Concordia University. The focus of her works is a reflection on notions of cultural identity, memory and dislocation. Remaking is the primary approach in Ebrahimi’s work and her research-based practice is nourished by the interplay of her studio practice, personal experiences and research on historical artifacts. 

Ebrahimi is the co-curator and co-founder of Nowruz Projects, a multicultural collective which curates events focused on the rite of Nowruz in Western Asia. The project is developed around the theme of “ritual as a space for rebirth, reunion and appreciation of diversity”.

jongwook park

South Korea-born Jongwook Park holds an MFA in Communication Design from Sangmyung University (Seoul) and a diploma in Animation Art and Design from LaSalle College (Montreal). Living in a foreign land forced him out of his psychological comfort zone, a disorientation that led him to objectively re-examine the familiar. His artwork draws on traditional art practices while adopting new techniques and is distinguished by his unique treatment of line drawing. His work has been presented in exhibitions and publications in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver, as well as South Korea, Japan, and the United States.

⇒ https://jon-p.weebly.com/

hea r. kim

South Korean-born, Canadian immigrant Hea R. Kim explores overlapping technical art processes within fibers and sculptures. Visually inspired by her Korean heritage, Kim’s explorations share elements of childhood recollections and imagination. With her formal education in South Korea and her in-depth studies in material processes and contemporary art in Montreal, Kim aims to visualize the innocent period when days are filled with infinite possibility, indulgence, and mystery. Kim has exhibited her works across Canada and South Korea. She had a solo exhibition Vomiting Flowers at MAI in 2019. This exhibition will be presented again at Eastern Edge Gallery in St. John’s Newfoundland in March 2022.

tanha gomes

Tanha Gomes is the recipient of 2020-21 PWM + MAI joint support for artists* interested in working with a dramaturg.

Visual artist and cultural worker, Tanha Gomes has worked in several artist-run centres and art galleries in Montreal. Since 2011, she has been involved in initiatives that bring art to communities with people of all ages.

Born into a multicultural family in Brazil, she moved to Canada as a teenager and has since lived between these two worlds. Her immigration experience leads her to explore the links between displacement, death and memory. Fascinated by the traces of personal history on people’s bodies and trajectories, she uses photography in order to conduct intimate and delicate explorations of identity. She seeks to create contemplative works using time as raw material, often with long exposures that require bodies to remain still. Tanha’s images are marked by a performative aspect, through simple imprints or a promise of movement. Recently graduated from a master’s degree in Arts Education, she aspires to develop her artistic practice around cultural identity.

This partnership is supported by the Government of Quebec and the City of Montreal as part of l’Entente sur le Développement Culturel, and by the Canada Council for the Arts.

Photo credit: Daniele Barroso

cécilia bracmort

Cécilia Bracmort is a French and Canadian artist/curator who favours the mixing of genres, transdisciplinarity and experimentation in her art and curatorial practice.

Through her multifocal vision linked to her different “layers of identity”, Cecilia Bracmort’s projects create bridges between themes to which she feels connected, such as history, identity, ecology and spirituality.

Through her artistic and curatorial work, she wants to open the door to other perceptions of the world to emerge, to encourage people to think outside the “white” box and to invite them to see the world from new angles.

In 2019, she curated the exhibition Reclaming My Place at Warren G Flowers Art Gallery at Dawson College, showcasing the works of artists Shanna Strauss, Cedar-Eve and Sharon Norwood and calling for greater visibility of BIPOC women artists in the arts community. Supported by Alliance in 2018-29, this exhibition will be presented again in 2021 at Lethbridge Center. Her new Alliance project aims at improving the visibility of her profile in the visual arts scene and refining her communication skills.

diane hau yu wong

Diane Hau Yu Wong is the recipient of 2020-22 articule + MAI joint support for curators.

Diane Hau Yu Wong is an emerging curator and art historian based in unceded Coast Salish Territories & Tiohtiá:ke territory. She graduated with a BFA in Art History from Concordia University in 2018. Her curatorial practice and research are largely based on her experience as a second-generation immigrant and the intersection between community and diasporic identity.  For the articule + MAI support for curators, Diane is examining digital futurism as a method to re-imagine a better world and sustainable solidarity among BIPOC communities through technoculture and speculative fiction. She most recently curated Centre A’s 2019 recent graduate exhibition titled (dis)location (dis)connect (dis)appearance, examining the loss of language, tradition, and culture in the diasporic community.

This partnership is supported by the Government of Quebec and the City of Montreal as part of l’Entente sur le Développement Culturel, and by the Canada Council for the Arts.

 

soroush aram

Soroush Aram is the recipient of 2020-21 Mandoline hybride + MAI joint support for artists. He is an Iranian multidisciplinary visual artist working in Montreal. After completing a course in Fine Arts at the University of Tehran in 2002, Soroush developed a particular aesthetic that interweaves drawing and performative art and juggles between images of the past and dreams of the future. His work has been presented and recognized in Iran since 2010. Today, Soroush’s artistic career takes place mainly in Canada, where he gradually integrates the different spheres of contemporary Quebec art scene, by participating in exhibitions, residencies, workshops and artist support programs (DAM; Montréal en Arts; SKOL; Montréal Arts Interculturels). As part of Alliance, Soroush’s project Réminescence explores traces of the past and memory through a series of drawings of recovered objects from the music industry, a performance and videos from interviews conducted by the artist.
This partnership is supported by the Government of Quebec and the City of Montreal as part of l’Entente sur le Développement Culturel, and by the Canada Council for the Arts.