BIOGRAPHY

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Mozhdeh Zandieh-Grayson is a multidisciplinary visual artist born in Tehran/Iran, based in Dubai and awarded 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, later, she follows and advances her knowledge and education at university in Graphic Art and Design (BA Honours). While her professional focus was on design, the fascination of the fine art world and her feeling for studying and practice art never rest and constantly flows in her everyday life. In 2014 she was nominated for participation 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, events, contests and awards.

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Her hands-on working in various disciplines, architecture, design and fine art provides her possibilities to employ new media which often overlapping the 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 lifeline and 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. Based on metaphor analogy and through poetical imagery, 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 traversed conceptualism trying to formulate a bridge between the invention of forms and the formation of her concepts, questions and imaginations. 

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"I am a questioner, an artist, an explorer, preoccupied with existentialism, humanism, realism and despite existing in an irrational universe through my work of art I'm trying to make rational decisions to leap to conclusions that logic cannot reach. I am an explorer in thinking and art is my shortcut for the closeness of thinking by making, whether in the width of my painting or the weight of my sculpture and or the cast of my photos. For me being an artist is simply being myself. I don't see limitation, not for us, neither for art. When I make art, I do not think about art, I think about us—human, how we see and how we think, perception is everything and my practice is constantly trying to find ways of discovering new things about humans so in the process I discover more about myself and my surroundings in the richness of connections and divisions. From that, making art is my way of exploring today humans related matters with a hope to create visual reflections, for feeling, touching, hearing —for change in the freedom of mind. Art is a verb and has always been made from change and for change." 

CV

Born in Tehran, Iran 

Live in Dubai

Studied in UK

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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

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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

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EXHIBITIONS

World Art Dubai— Dubai, UAE  2021

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

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PUBLICATIONS

Making A Seeing, Photo E-Book   —  publishing date 2021

Law Update Magazine, DIFC-UAE  link  - P79 & P91  —  2020

The Best of 2016, international Emerging Artist Awards  -  link   P.27 — 2016

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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​