Mohamad-Said Baalbaki

Mohamad-Said Baalbaki lives and works between Beirut, where he was born, and Berlin, Germany, where he studied at the University of Fine Arts and received his Master of Art in 2008. In 2005, he was awarded the Meisterschülerpreis des Präsidenten Prize (President’s Prize) from the Berlin University of Fine Arts.

Since 1998, he has shown his work in Berlin, New York and Beirut. He has also exhibited in contemporary art fairs, such as Scope Basel (2009), Art Miami (2008), and Art Paris (2011).

Initially trained as a painter at the Institute of Fine arts of the Lebanese University in Beirut, Baalbaki has recently been creating mixed media installations, such as Al Buraq, shown in Beirut in 2010. In this ongoing project, he explores the mechanisms of perception within the context of the museum while criticizing the institutional power of this institution and its reception by society. Baalbaki aims to show that the interpretation of a work of art is tied to cultural conventions, as well as religious and ideological factors. For Rebirth, he tackles similar themes by virtually reconstructing the missing arm of the Martyrs’ statue that graces the eponymous square in downtown Beirut. He exhibits it as a museum object to question the public’s perception of art and the nuances of meaning between authentic and counterfeit, within the context of Beirut’s tormented history.