| Fifteen years ago, just a few months shy of his 20th birthday, Ahmed Alsoudani defaced a mural of Saddam Hussein in his Baghdad neighborhood. Alsoudani, who grew up in Baghdad, fills his paintings with vivid colors and graphic imagery depicting his feelings about war in Iraq. It was a youthful prank. Politics wasn’t part of Alsoudani’s vocabulary. He wasn’t protesting anything. But the consequences were steep. The Saddam regime was violent and unpredictable, and Alsoudani felt at risk in a city full of fear and threat. A frightened teenager, he arranged for a final tea with his family, assuming he would never see them again, and quietly slipped away. |  |
Bob Keyes
Fifteen years ago, just a few months shy of his 20th birthday, Ahmed Alsoudani defaced a mural of Saddam Hussein in his Baghdad neighborhood. Alsoudani, who grew up in Baghdad, fills his paintings with vivid colors and graphic imagery depicting his feelings about war in Iraq. It was a youthful prank. Politics wasn’t part of Alsoudani’s vocabulary. He wasn’t protesting anything. But the consequences were steep. The Saddam regime was violent and unpredictable, and Alsoudani felt at risk in a city full of fear and threat. A frightened teenager, he arranged for a final tea with his family, assuming he would never see them again, and quietly slipped away. He traveled by taxi to Kurdistan and eventually to Syria, where he lived four years before seeking and receiving political asylum from the U.S. Embassy in Damascus.Alsoudani eventually landed in the United States, made his way to Maine and found himself on a hot afternoon in August 2001 on Portland’s Spring Street, staring up a long set of steps to the entrance of the Clapp House. At the time, Clapp was home to the admissions office of Maine College of Art. Alsoudani spoke little English and had no portfolio to speak of, just a few rough paintings he carried with him. But he wanted to be an artist, and MECA was his best hope. Circumstance, fate, and Alsoudani’s stubborn nature brought him to that moment. He summoned the courage, stepped into the imposing Greek Revival building and announced in a humble, broken voice, “My name is Ahmed, and I would like to be a painter.”
Not quite a decade later, Alsoudani, now 35, fluent in English and living a dreamy international life, was named to Forbes Magazine’s Watch List as one of the most collectible emerging artists, and is a leading voice of visual expression from vanguard Middle Eastern artists. His paintings sell for $70,000 each, and he has collectors all over the world. He counts among his patrons the most influential names in modern art, including mega-collector Charles Saatchi. He’s been invited to show at the Venice Biennale in 2011, and is working on a private commission of a large painting for the opening for the Museum of Modern Art in Doha, Qatar, in 2011.
Alsoudani’s arrival as an international art star seemed destined. Right away, his work caught the attention of MECA’s painting faculty, and in particular his first professor, Sean Foley, who encouraged Alsoudani’s use of color and exaggerated, shocking images. He came to Maine at a fateful moment in his own life and in the history of the modern world. A month into Alsoudani’s Portland residency, terrorists attacked on U.S. soil. Revenge swept the country into war. A newcomer to America with dark skin and a Middle Eastern accent, Alsoudani stood witnesses to terrorism, suffered ignorance and intolerance, and watched helplessly as his chosen adopted country tore apart his native land. He recognized images of Baghdad neighborhoods on TV, and feared for his family’s survival each and every day.
His early drawings suggested chaos and confusion. His work became increasingly violent and graphic. “Most of my work deals with the war,” he said in advance of a Portland gallery show during his undergraduate MECA days. “The war for me is a life-and-death issue. I’ve been dealing with it since before I’ve been here, and it’s hard to step away from it. I’m not interested in showing blood and war. I’m working really hard to capture the moment between when the aircraft are attacking and the moment after the attack, that line between life and death.”
This article is reprinted with the permission of MaineToday Media.
