Kamrooz Aram

Kamrooz Aram (born in Shiraz, Iran, 1978) is a contemporary artist whose diverse artistic practice engages the complicated relationship between traditional non-Western art and Western Modernism. Through a variety of forms including painting, collage, drawing and installation, Aram has found the potential for image-making to function critically in its use as a tool for a certain renegotiation of history.

Kamrooz Aram received his master's degree in Fine Arts from Columbia University in 2003. Solo and two-person exhibitions include Palimpsest: Unstable Paintings for Anxious Interiors at Green Art Gallery, Dubai, UAE (2014); Kamrooz Aram/Julie Weitz at Michelle Grabner's space The Suburban, Chicago, Illinois (2013); Brute Ornament: Kamrooz Aram and Seher Shah, curated by Murtaza Vali, at Green Art Gallery, Dubai, UAE (2012); Negotiations at Perry Rubenstein Gallery, New York, New York (2011); Generation After Generation, Revolution after Revelation at LAXART, Los Angeles, California (2010) and Kamrooz Aram: Realms and Reveries at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA), North Adams, Massachusetts (2006). He has shown in numerous group exhibitions including Beauty Reigns: A Baroque Sensibility in Recent Painting, McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX (2014); roundabout, City Gallery Wellington, New Zealand (2010); the Busan Biennale, (2006); MoMA PS1's Greater New York 2005; and the Prague Biennale I (2003). Aram was one of the winners of the Abraaj Group Art Prize 2014; he has also been awarded grants from Art Matters (2014), the New York Foundation for the Arts (2004) and the Jacob K. Javits Fellowship Program (2001). His work has been featured and reviewed widely in publications such as Art in America, Artforum.com, The New York Times, Asian Art Newspaper, The Village Voice and the arts and culture segment on BBC Persian: Tamasha. Aram's work can be found in public collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, Ohio; the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, Waltham, MA; and M+, Hong Kong. He lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.