“My work is a reaction to war, not a chronicle. I am repeating the shock over and over again, to rid myself of the nightmare.” — Serwan Baran
Serwan Baran was born in Baghdad, Iraq, in 1968. A leading figure of post-war Iraqi art, Baran is known for his psychologically charged depictions of conflict and the human condition. He studied at the College of Fine Arts, University of Babylon, graduating in 1992, and later taught at the University of Baghdad for seven years. During his early career, Baran served as an army painter under the Ba’ath regime, an experience that would define his later practice. Since relocating first to Amman and then to Beirut in 2013, he has developed a body of work that interrogates collective memory, violence, and authority through large-scale paintings and installations.
Working across painting, sculpture, installation and mixed media, Baran employs a restrained palette of earthen tones and dense layering to evoke the material and psychological residue of war. His subjects, usually soldiers, generals, ruins, and spectral animals, emerge from abstraction, reflecting both historical trauma and personal witness. Over the years, his approach has evolved, engaging myth, deconstruction of power, symbolism, and stylistic tension between figuration and dissolution, so that his works operate as both narrative and allegory.
Baran represented Iraq with Fatherland at the 58th Venice Biennale (2019), the country’s first solo pavilion, featuring monumental canvases and sculptural installations constructed from military uniforms and debris collected from conflict zones.
He has held solo exhibitions at Saleh Barakat Gallery (Beirut, 2020), Agial Art Gallery (Beirut, 2018), Gallery Misr (Cairo, 2020), Nabad Art Gallery (Amman, 2013), and Matisse Art Gallery (Marrakech, 2013). His work has also appeared in the Cairo Biennale (1999), the Al-Kharafi Biennial (Kuwait, 2011), and the Marrakech Biennale (2012).
Baran received several national awards in Iraq during the 1990s, including the Youth Prize (1990) and First and Second Prizes at the Baghdad International Festival of Plastic Arts (1994-95). He is a member of the International Association of Art (AIAP-UNESCO), the Iraqi Fine Art Association, and the Iraqi National Artists Association. His works are held in public and private collections across the Middle East and Europe, including the Ramzi and Saeda Dalloul Art Foundation (Beirut), the Barjeel Art Foundation (Sharjah), and Darat al-Funun (Amman).
