Maher Naji
Palestinian Painter
Maher Naji is a Palestinian painter, based in Gaza. Maher's family was forced to flee from Northern Sawafer Village prior to his birth, and was born in 1963 in Jabaliya Refugee Camp in Gaza, where he finished his primary and secondary education. He left for Russia in 1983 to join the Baron Stieglitz Art Academy in St. Petersburg and returned to Gaza in 1994 after receiving his PhD in Arabian Architecture. During his stay in Russia, he participated in numerous exhibitions and since coming back to Gaza he has continued to pursue his work as an artist, whilst under blockade since 2007. Maher's artwork is inspired by his family's memories of Palestine before 1948. He relies on his mother's vast details of her memories, for every line and shape in his paintings, his art is a means of preserving Palestinian culture in the midst of Israeli settler colonial siege. The memories he paints, are also the hopeful visualisations of return.
Follow Maher Naji in Return Week II
Art Exhibition: Visualising Return
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