B. 1983
Visual artist Zakaria Ramhani's approach is unique; his paintings express a personal fascination with portraiture and the multifaceted significance associated with representation of the human form. Through his large-scale pieces, with allusions to political and art history, he uses Arabic calligraphy as both formal gesture and linguistic content.
The son of a painter, Ramhani developed technical skills at an early age absorbed from his father’s studio. Deeply impacted by the way that religious conservatives criticised his father for making figurative art, Zakaria Ramhani chose to use and transform the Islamic tradition of calligraphy, whose abstract nature allowed artists to avoid violating the prohibition against figurative representation.
Zakaria Ramhani got his diploma to become a fine art teacher in Tangier in 2003, and worked as a teacher, before devoting himself entirely to his art. The artist has exhibited throughout Europe and the Middle East. His paintings have been well received in many exhibitions and art fairs including the Barbican Centre in London, Zoom Art Fair in Miami, British Museum, at the DIFC Dubai, the Cairo Biennial, Dak’Art Biennial of Contemporary African Art in Sénégal, and L’Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris. Ramhani’s work is held by private and institutional collections in Morocco, France, Belgium, the UK and UAE.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2014, Connotation, Artspace Dubai Gallery. Dubai, UAE
2013, May Allah Forgive me, Julie Meneret Contemporary Art, New York, USA
2012, My Face is a Word, Atelier 21, Casablanca, Morocco
Zoom Art Fair, Miami, USA.
Faces of Your Other: Atelier 21, Casablanca, Morocco
Tabari Artspace Dubai, UAE
2009, From Right to Left, Centre d’Exposition Val-d’Or, Quebec, Canada
2008, Faces of Your Other, Artspace, Dubai, UAE
2006, Le temps de la mort, Galerie de la Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris, France
2006, Corps possédés/Solitude collective, Galerie Crous des Beaux Arts, Paris, France
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2014, Art Toronto art fair. Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Toronto
2014, Memory, Place, Desire, Cantor Fitzgerald Gallery, Haverford College, Haverford, USA, curated by Carole Solomone
2014, Tabari Artspace Dubai, UAE
2014, Art 14 London Art Fair, London, UK
2013, 25 Years of Arabic Creativity, Emirate Palace, Abu Dhabi, UAE
2013, Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris, France
2013, National Museum of Barhain, Manama, Bahrain
2013, Art 13 Art Fair, London, UK
2013, Tabari Artspace Dubai, UAE
2013, Atelier 21, Casablanca, Morocco
2012, Barbican Centre, London, UK. Curated by Vincenzo Sanfo
2012, Art Dubai, Contemporary Art Fair, UAE
2011, Marrakech Art Fair, Morocco, Art Dubai, UAE
2010, Marrakech Art Fair, Morocco, Art Dubai, UAE
2009, Made in Arnhem, International Festival of the Arts, Arnhem, Netherlands
2009, On the Ground, Underground, Intramoenia ExtrArt (Collaboration with Achille Bonito Oliva ),
Barletta, Italy - Art Dubai, UAE
2008, the 11 Cairo Biennale, Egypt
2008 Dak’Art, 8th Biennale of Contemporary African Art, Dakar, Senegal
2008, Art Dubai, UAE
2008, Word into Art : Artists of the Modern Middle East, British Museum at DIFC, Dubai, UAE, curated by Venetia Porter.