Ahmad Kleige was born in Aleppo, Syria in 1964. He studied at the Fathi Mohamed Fine Arts Center in Aleppo. His powerful paintings convey the tragedies of the contemporary Middle East–from the massacres of Halabja, to the destruction of the Syrian Civil War—emphasizing the human cost of these political catastrophes. His affective paintings which reveal disembodied heads against muted backgrounds, allow the viewer to focus on their melancholic facial expressions and allude to the political violence his subjects endure. In his architectural paintings, urban landscapes characterized by destroyed, densely built environments reminiscent of refugee camps, shanty towns and periperal habitations, appear abstracted. Kelige graduated from Fathi Mohamed Fine Arts Center, Aleppo, in 1988 and is a member of the Syrian Fine Arts Union in Damascus. He has participated in numerous group exhibitions in Lebanon at Unesco Palace, the American University of Beirut, and the Sursock Museum and has held several solo exhibitions in Beirut and Damascus. His work has been acquired by different private collections and is permanently exhibited at Galerie Janine Rubeiz. The artist lives and works in Lebanon.
