|
|
Drawing from A Great Country Welcomes You, 1989
Pencil on paper
Collection of the Canadian Museum of Civilization
(Photo: Harry Foster © Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation)
" I wanted a country to belong to, a place to establish myself,
a country that would recognize my presence and my rights. It was proposed
to me that I immigrate to Canada. I had no idea; I only knew that it was
a country covered with snow, an industrialized and democratic country that
welcomes people coming from all over the world. So I accepted. [...]
I arrived in Canada on February 7, 1989. "
Extracts from an interview with the artist
Adel Alnaser was born in 1954 in Babylon, Iraq. A child of a large
family, he learned, early on, his father's coppersmith trade, and decided to become a
painter. To pay for his courses at the Fine Arts Institute of Baghdad, he did copperwork
every evening after school. Once his courses were completed, he left Iraq and its
political climate to pursue studies in visual arts and to broaden his horizons. He went
to Italy, studied at the Fine Arts Academy of Rome, founded, with other students, an
association for Iraqi artists in exile, and travelled across Europe.
![Adel Alnaser](/web/20061029120602im_/http://www.civilization.ca/cultur/cespays/images/pay2_01p3.gif)
Adel Alnaser,
Montreal, Quebec, 2000
Rawi Hage
Gelatine silver prints
Collection of the Canadian Museum of Civilization
In 1984, the Iraqi government did not renew his passport, and Italy refused him
citizenship. Adel Alnaser then appealed to the United Nations, which encouraged him
to turn to Canada. Arriving in Toronto in 1989, he began a journal in the form of
drawings. Later, since he couldn't find work that was sufficiently well paid and that
would allow him to draw (ink and pencil) and to paint (oils and watercolours), he chose
to live in Montreal, where he managed to earn his living by drawing.
Drawings and texts from A Great Country Welcomes You, 1989
Pencil and ink on paper
Collection of the Canadian Museum of Civilization
(Photo : Harry Foster © Société du Musée canadien des civilisations)
After an epic period characterized by "scenes dripping with blood," Alnaser's work
became more self-critical: One doesn't deal with war through [images of] war.
. . . I found a method to express my suffering and the suffering of the people I come
from, as well as their political and social problems, in a more aesthetic way. He
went on to explore the links between Mesopotamian civilization and Muslim heritage,
and began to better familiarize himself with North American art.
Adel Alnaser's works have been exhibited in Canada, Italy, France and the Middle East.
The Canadian Museum of Civilization has acquired one of his works.
|