In Imaginary Homeland, artist Kevork Mourad explores the shifting meanings of home through memory, displacement, and the act of making. In this exhibition, architectural fragments, family stories, and personal rituals are reassembled into new visual languages.
Through layered drawings on denim and linen – materials that bear traces of labour and care – the artist reflects on childhood homes, many of which now exist only in memory. Referencing historic sites in Aleppo, these works evoke not just physical structures, but intimate moments: the curve of handwriting, the scent of a kitchen, or the echo of a lullaby.
Some works draw on the mythic. One series references a saint who lived atop a column near Aleppo, deemed mad in life and revered in death. Pilgrims once consumed pieces of the column, believing it held the power to bring fertility. In Mourad’s interpretation, the sacred and the absurd merge into a lasting symbol of endurance and belief.
Elsewhere, 24 small paintings quietly honour human relationships with land i.e, planting, harvesting, and the slow, rhythmic care that connects hands to soil. These intimate works reflect cycles of renewal and the dialogue between cultivation and return.
Two installations expand the exhibition’s scope: one commemorates those lost while crossing the Mediterranean, while another considers the fragile beginnings of language and culture. In both, fragility and resilience coexist.
This body of work raises questions about what is carried when one is displaced. What remains when buildings are abandoned, and what transforms through memory? The artist’s approach is both archival and imaginative—preserving what risks being forgotten, and reimagining what may yet be reclaimed.
Imaginary Homeland invites viewers to reflect on what is inherited through stories, textures, and gestures, asking how new forms of belonging can emerge through remembrance.
Location: Galerie Tanit, Mar Mekhayel, Lebanon
Date: May 29 till July 03, 2025