LATCH (iwi). In the Kunsthalle Messmer is visible from 7 March, an exhibition of works by Arif Aziz. Messmer thus makes the prelude to a gallery of Michael Schultz (Berlin) organized series of exhibitions of works from the private collection of this Azerbaijani painter. The nearest stations are Berlin and Dresden. For the first time was an exhibition of Arif Aziz seen in Germany, says the director of the Kunsthalle in bars, Dagmar Thesing. With nearly 80 works, the exhibition offers a cross-section of the works of the painter, the Azerbaijan had declared a “National Artist”. He counted in his homeland of the most important painters of his generation. The artistic richness and diversity of his work have been the development of Azerbaijani art important impulses. A combination of oriental tradition and western style called Thesing the stages of Aziz ‘work shown at the Kunsthalle. Paintings in oil and acrylic, partly applied thickly, can be seen. In some of his works Aziz seems to see the culture and the motives of his home through the lens of development of Western art. Time representational, sometimes abstract, sometimes impressionistic.
Evident are known from the Orient ornaments in different forms. He also offers images that look like a stroll through the art world of the West. The very recent works, which can be seen, act as partly colorful bonds from modern western styles. Thesing called his work a fruitful cultural exchange between East and West. Arif Aziz was born in 1943 in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku. He graduated from the State Art School and then studied graphic design at the Stroganov Moscow University. In 1973 he was awarded the second prize of the Youth Union of Azerbaijan in Baku and the first prize of the international graphic competition in Vilnius (Latvia) in 1978 the first prize of the International Exhibition in Moscow. He is a professor at the State University of Art and Culture in Baku and in 1991 was vice-rector in the areas of painting and applied arts. Great inspiration was the artist on his many study tours in the whole world. The culture and the nature of Senegal and the famous Parisian vaudeville “Moulin Rouge” seem to have made a particular impression on Arif Aziz. So these places appear again and again in his paintings. His work has been exhibited for decades, especially in the Russian-oriental room. In 1985 he was represented among others in the Caucasion Biennale in Dagestan and 2002 in the Asian Art Biennale in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Many of his works are now in major museums and collections, so in the Azerbaijan State Museum of Art in Baku, the Moscow Art Museum North, Senegal State Art Museum and in Tabriz Shaxriya State Museum in Baku.
