BIOGRAPHY
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Mozhdeh Zandieh-Grayson is a multidisciplinary visual artist born in Tehran/Iran, based in Dubai and obtained her Master of Fine Art distinction from the UK (UCA). Her artistic and academic practices originate at art and architecture school in Tehran in her early teens. She follows and forwards her education at university in Graphic Art (BA Honours). While her professional focus was on design, the fascination of the fine art world and her study and exercising art never rest. In 2014 she was nominated to participate in the biennale in Paris which brought her a pleasant success. That unexpected achievement in the realm of art was a turning point in her life and her career. Since 2017 Mozhdeh has focused on her profession as an artist and fine arts educator. Her works exhibited, nominated, featured and participated in several international art shows, contests and awards.
Her hands-on working in various disciplines, architecture, design and fine art provides her possibilities to employ new media which often overlapping edges of conventional artistic mediums in multiple forms such as mixed-media photography, motion art, sculpture, installation, diagrams, drawing and painting. The concept matter of her works emerges from her life trail. Mozhdeh was born in the post-revolution era of Iran and grew up during the Iran-Iraq war. Her childhood shaped in the shadow of the war and her life formed from the aftermath and chaos of the environment. Years after the war, life led her away from her native land where she found the being in the chasms between "words" and "worlds" and her life experiences intertwined with multi-perception of living. Those cognitive novels of life, the phenomenon of the world of lingual-ism, the significance of communications along with her pre/absorption in the philosophical study of the human subject profoundly influenced her work of art. In her art-making, she explores and addresses human relations and perception in vital and emotional states of communication. Her primary point of reference is the human mind and the human body and the philosophy of the "border" in one's exterior and interior of being. Throughout her Master of Fine Arts, Mozhdeh explored conceptualism trying to formulate a bridge between the invention of forms and the formation of her concepts and questions.
"For me being an artist is simply being myself. When I make art, I do not think about art, I think about the US—human, how we see and how we think, perception is everything. I am preoccupied with existentialism, humanism, realism. My works of art are constantly trying to find ways of discovering new things about humans, so in the process, I discovering more about myself and my surroundings in the richness of connections and divisions. From that, making art is my way for exploring today humans related matters with a hope to create visual reflections, for feeling, touching, hearing in the freedom of mind —for change." Art is my shortcut for the closeness of thinking by making."
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CV
Born in Tehran, Iran
Live in Dubai
Studied in UK
EDUCATION
Completed three years postgraduate master degree in Fine Arts with distinction from University for Creative Arts, (UCA) UK, 2020 - MFA
Graduated as a Graphic Designer from Soore Art University of Tehran, Iran in 2001- BA
Complete four years of Visual Arts and Architecture at the School of Arts, Tehran, Iran, 1997
ARTISTIC ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS
Finalist Artist, Rove Art Prize — Dubai, UAE 2020
Featured Artist in Al Tamimi Group international digital publication —Dubai 2020
Artist nominee for Visual Art Prize —Dubai, UAE 2020
Finalist artist in ART EXPO NewYork Contest —France 2019
Selected artist for digital installation at DIFC by Emerging Artist Award— Dubai, UAE 2018
Finalist artist, CFA Artist of the Year Award —France 2018
Artist of the Week by Emerging Scene —Dubai, UAE 2018
Member of artists' Committee at International Award of Contemporary Art "ARTPROTAGONIST" —Italy 2015
Selected artist for Next Step Biennale —Paris, France 2014
Winer designer of Intramural Creative Design Contest —Tehran, Iran 2001
EXHIBITIONS
Digital Installation at DIFC Art Nights — Dubai, UAE 2020
Group show, World Art Dubai— Dubai, UAE 2020
Group show, No-Show Exhibition, UK, 2020
Group show, Total Art Gallery, Quoz Arts Fest — Dubai, UAE 2019
Installation at DIFC Art Nights — Dubai, UAE 2019
Digital installation at DIFC — Dubai, UAE 2018
Solo Artist at Dubai Art Fair, World Art Dubai— Dubai, UAE 2015
Group show, Art Plus Gallery —Dubai, UAE 2015
Next Step Biennale —Paris, France 2014
Group show, Art Plus Gallery, Window I — Dubai, UAE 2014
PUBLICATIONS
Making A Seeing, Photo E-Book - Upcoming — 2020
Law Update Magazine, DIFC-UAE link - P79 & P91 — 2020
The Best of 2016, international Emerging Artist Awards - link P.27 — 2016
PROFESSIONS & EXPERIENCES
Art Educator, Dubai, 2017 - Current
Art Director at AUDIO UAE, Dubai, 2020
Creative Manager at Cooper Searle, London, UK, 2017 - 2020
Fine Arts Educator at Soul Art Center, Dubai, UAE, 2016 - 2017
Creative designer for Yahlive advertising Campaign, Abu Dhabi, UAE in 2013 -2014
Art Director and Studio Manager at Provision Media, Dubai, UAE in 2011- 2013
Graphic Designer and Brand Coordinator at AVA, Dubai, UAE 2007 - 2009
Co-Founder and Designer at Line and Design House, Tehran, Iran 2002 - 2006
Designer and illustrator for Institute of the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults, annual book festival —Tehran, Iran 2002
Art Teacher - Elementary school, Tehran, Iran, 2001- 2002