From the opening of the exhibition

From the opening of the 40th anniversary exhibition of the Association of Visual Arts Artists of Northern Greece in the Gallery of the Society of Macedonian Studies on 3/11/2023
Foto: Nikos Bendilas

Two Cities Marked My Life.

I was born in the coastal city of Tetwan, Kurdistan. A city of 20 thousand inhabitants then and about 100 thousand now, on the shores of Lake Wan, which we call the sea, a large, salty and deep lake slightly larger than the area of Evia, at an altitude of 1700 meters above sea level.

I lived there until I was 19, followed by the difficult years of illegality due to my participation in the Kurdish liberation struggle and then as a political refugee I arrived in Greece.

For 38 years now I have lived in Thessaloniki, a city that as a location always reminds me of Tetwan, of course on a much larger scale.

Here I studied art and here I charted my artistic path, as well as here I created a family and had my children.

The urban landscape always moves me and is present in my painting. It is, after all, the space in which we live but also where our historical memory takes place.

Serhad Bapir

Note: These words accompany the photo of my work in the exhibition catalogue.

City, 2023, acrylics, 130X100 cm.

The exhibition invitation