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Pejman Ebadi: ‘Tales From The Other Side’
 28th April - 24th May 2014

‘For me, creating comes closer to something that I would describe as a shamanistic voyage… its language belongs to another world, rather, to the other world; the world of the unknown and the unseen- that which the visible is merely a mirror of.’ Pejman Ebadi

Pejman Ebadi was born in Tehran, Iran 1982, at the height of the Iran-Iraq war. At the age of two, his family fled the war stricken homeland to find refuge in France. At only four years old, Pejman’s father discovered his precocious gift for painting and encouraged him to express himself freely without any particular guidance. Without formal art education, the young Pejman taught himself by studying works of major 20th century artists. His first exhibition was when he was six years old and since 1990, he has held more than fifty solo exhibitions throughout North America and Europe. Pejman now lives and works in Nice.

Pejman is an improvisational artist, working straight onto his canvases without planning what the finished piece will be. The blank page compels him to create form and colour, drawing them out of instinct. With each stab in the dark, the artist mesmerises us with the unseen things that lurk below the surface. Spanning over two decades, the artist’s wildly diverse style encompasses scrawling angry creatures, sun-striped horizons, withered swastikas and voodoo symbols. The gods and goddesses of mythology battle out their wars on canvas; their bad tempered dragons and slack-jawed totems menace the bright Aztec colours. Bringing his compositions to life with fierce graffiti, this young Picasso-Basquiat is surely a force to be reckoned with.
 

FRAGMENTS
by E. S Jones

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” C.S Lewis

As a child Pejman Ebadi was encouraged to freely pursue his creativity, and held his first exhibition at only six years old. By the time he turned eighteen, this young prodigy had produced some 1500 works documenting his unique insights. As a result, his paintings give the sense of opening his diaries; volumes and volumes from childhood through adolescence, and into young adulthood.

This maturing creativity is a fascinating process to watch unfold. From early nightmarish visions of sharp toothed monsters that hide under the bed, to exercise book doodles, rebellious graffiti or sophisticated word play. These graphic daydreams imagine underworlds, spells and curses- they are mind maps that expose fears and rejections, melancholy and self-doubt. The artist leaves these manifestations strewn behind him, wondering aloud at ideas of existence, ego and identity.

The name ‘Pejman’ means one who is broken hearted, and these paintings do reveal some painful personal fractures. However, in allowing things to fall apart, a deeper understanding can be reached. In exposing the darkest self to the light, we become more human. Such a vulnerability and thirst for truth sets Pejman apart as one of our most relevant artists today. Every thing this poet-painter-philosopher has achieved so far, is simply a fragment of the incredible things still to come.

Pejman Ebadi has only really just begun.

The exhibition is held alongside a sculpture collection which features works by Oleg Prokofiev, Eleanor Cardozo, Nicola Godden, Richard L.Minns, Andy Cheese, Jamie McCartney, Ian Edwards, Gianfranco Meggiato, Massimiliano Cacchiarelli Principi and Palolo Valdes.
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