Dr. T. Deniz Zengin
Lokman Ahmad is one of the leading figures in the Kurdish art scene. Learn more about how Lukman is raising awareness about Kurdish life and culture through his work.
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First of all, who is Lukman Ahmad?
At first thank you very much
I am Lukman Ahmad, a Kurdish artist from Syria. I was born in 1972 in the city of Ad-Darbasiyah, near the Turkish border. in 1981 we moved to live in the city of Al-Hasakah, and there I studied the three stages of study, and after that I tried to study art at the university, but my father absolutely refused to study art, and thus I was deprived of university studies. I moved to the USA in 2010 and until this moment I live in Virginia.
Since my childhood, I have been fond of art and sculpture, and this passion continued until adolescence, and then I began my professional attempt, and then participated in exhibitions, which I started in 1998- Kurdish Art and Culture Festival, in Qamishli, Hasaka, Syria.
What are your strongest memories from your childhood and early teenage years, whether related to people, moments or places? When did you first become conscious of both your inclinations and to what extent has your family environment encouraged you to fully develop them?
Frankly, when I was in primary school in the city of Hasaka, I was 10 years old, I was taught by an Assyrian teacher named Lydia Karsh, who influenced my life path and directed me to art and encouraged me to participate in the pioneer competitions for creative children in Syria, and there is also my grandmother Noura khader that has had an impact on my life to this day.
What do you say about the imagination of an artist?
The artist’s imagination is the space in which he creates and produces the work of art. The imagination, as described by the surrealists, is that it knows neither forgiveness nor limits, and nothing stops it. In my opinion, imagination is an adventure whose results are unknown, and a good artist is one who ventures without hesitation.
How defining is the Kurdish dimension of your identity in your everyday life, art?
Frankly, my Kurdish identity is the main source of my artistic production. The Kurdish issue is not only in its political dimension, which was imposed on the international community. It is a cultural issue in its own sense. The Kurdish people have a great legacy in the cultural and civilizational history of mankind, and here we are, because of the distorted political definition, we lose their participation in Production of the region’s culture (the Middle East) and even the world. Just look at the Kurdish language spoken by nearly 40 million Kurds. This language is unknown, forgotten, and subjected to extermination because of the distorted policy. Imagine if this was shared with other languages in and became an officially recognized language, or Kurdish music and even Kurdish costumes, all were banned and persecuted because of politics. This is how I use all this heritage in my artistic work to define it as a cultural heritage and to show the aesthetic and artistic side in it, as well as trying to introduce them to others through beauty and art
How do you see or describe art?
Art is the most liberating aspect of human formation, and it is not related to beauty and its description only, as Plato says about it. It is the most complex process in creation and creativity, and because the artist, as I said earlier, is first an adventurous person, art leads to hidden worlds within human history and gives new images about these observations that consist in themselves of imagination.