Ibrahim Rashid

Ibrahim Rashid (born 1957, Baghdad, Iraq) is an Iraqi-Swedish-Canadian multidisciplinary artist based between Toronto, Canada, and Malmö, Sweden. His practice spans painting, drawing, woodcut printmaking, video, and installation. His work has been exhibited internationally including at the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, the Sharjah Biennial, Darat al Funun in Amman, and the Art Gallery of Burlington in Ontario. His video installation Looking for Oxygen was reviewed in Hyperallergic following its presentation at the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, in 2012.

Early Life and Education Rashid was born in Baghdad in 1957 into a family with a political and literary background. In 1975 he joined Tariq al-Shaab ("People's Path"), Iraq's Marxist newspaper, where he worked alongside poets and writers. When the paper was banned and its contributors persecuted, he later worked with poets Shafiq al-Kamali and Hamid Saeed at Afaq Arabiya.

He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Baghdad in 1982. The academy was the country's pre-eminent art institution, founded in part by Faiq Hassan (1914–1987), the pioneering figure of modern Iraqi painting who had studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and established the painting department on his return to Baghdad. Rashid studied under Hassan directly, as well as under the Polish professor Roman Artymowski, a central figure in modern Iraqi printmaking.

Rashid belongs to what has been described as the "eighties generation" of Iraqi artists — those who studied and exhibited in Baghdad during the 1980s under the conditions of war, censorship, and authoritarian control. During this period he worked as an illustrator for national magazines and newspapers, publishing art that critiqued sociopolitical realities under the ruling regime. He relocated partly to Toronto in 2005.

In Sweden he expanded his practice through studies in Screen Printing (Malmö, 1999) and Digital Art in Public Space (Malmö, 1996).

Work Rashid works across painting, drawing, woodcut printmaking, video, and installation. His work addresses exile, the erasure of cultural memory, ecological devastation, the human body under political systems, and the effects of war and authoritarianism. He also works as an art critic and writer. His essay Art and Environment or The Game of Burning Stones was published in the exhibition catalogue Beyond 100°C at Darat al Funun in 2004.

The Art Gallery of Burlington described his practice as engaging "sociopolitical themes, focusing on the land and human beings both as political bodies through radical and mythological imagery."

Hamlet in Prehistoric Times: To Be or Not to Be! (1980) A scenographic commission for an early Iraqi production of Hamlet, directed by Salah al-Qasab. The immersive set transformed a 20 × 10 metre space — walls, ceiling, and floor — using spray-painted grain sacks from Baghdad's Shorja markets, drawing on Mesopotamian traditions, cave art, and cinema.

Landscape in Process (2005–2012) A series of large-scale paintings created for Santiago Calatrava's Turning Torso in Malmö, a 54-storey residential tower completed in 2005 in the city's Western Harbour district. Rashid completed commissions connected to the tower in 2005, 2006, and 2012.

Fragile Absolute Landscape (2004–2007) A three-channel video installation projected simultaneously on three adjacent walls (600 × 400 cm), first developed during a residency at Darat al Funun in Amman in 2004. It was subsequently shown at YYZ Artists' Outlet, Toronto (2006), and the 8th Sharjah Biennial (2007).

Looking for Oxygen (2008–2012) A video installation showing a figure submerged at the bottom of an indoor swimming pool with black plastic bags taped around the head and torso, shown alongside an animation relating brain oxygen levels to bodily movement. Reviewing the work at the Mori Art Museum for Hyperallergic, Christopher Kuhl described it as "a frightening metaphor for the psychological result of nonstop anti-Arab hatred".

I Dive into the Well of My Body (2016) A series of large-scale acrylic paintings on canvas (200 × 160 cm) addressing identity, migration, and the effects of conflict on the human body.

Public Commissions 2012 — Landscape in Process, large-scale mural, Eriksberg, Sweden 2011 — Poetic Moments, public art bench, Burlington, Canada (winning commission) 2006 — Landscape in Process II, Turning Torso, Malmö, Sweden 2005 — Landscape in Process I, Turning Torso, Malmö, Sweden 2003 — What About My Garden, Turning Torso, Malmö, Sweden (winning commission) 2000 — Northern Landscapes II, City of Kiruna Hospital, Kiruna, Sweden 1999 — Process, Lomma Library, Lomma, Sweden 1996 — Music Rooms II, General Hospital, Malmö, Sweden (winning commission) 1994 — Music Rooms I, Municipality of Malmö, Sweden (winning commission)

Selected Exhibitions Group 2025 — Art Gallery of Burlington, Ontario — Earth Fingers 2011 — KW|ag 5th Biennial, Kitchener, Canada — Monochromatic 2007 — Sharjah Biennial 8, UAE — Art, Ecology & The Politics of Change: Still Life

Grants and Awards 2025 — Canada Council for the Arts, Arts Abroad — Venice Biennale, Canada 2024 — Toronto Arts Council, Creation Grant, Canada 2012 — Ontario Arts Council, Creation Grant, Canada 2011 — Iaspis, Swedish Arts Grants Committee International Programme, Sweden 2010 — Ontario Arts Council, Creation Grant, Canada 2007 — Canada Council for the Arts, Canada 2005 — Swedish National Council for Culture, Sweden 2005 — Copenhagen AMT and Skov Art Centre International Grant, Denmark 1987 — 5th Wasiti Biennale Painting Award, Baghdad, Iraq 1985 — Iraqi Art Critics First Prize, Baghdad, Iraq