Khaled Barakeh

(b. 1976)

For more information about the education, work and experience of Khaled Barakeh please see his website www.khaledbarakeh.com.

Khaled Barakeh is a Berlin-based Syrian artist and cultural activist whose work often revolves around power structures in context of identity, culture and history. He graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts in Damascus, Funen Art Academy in Odense and the Städelschule Art Academy in Frankfurt a.M. He has exhibited at Künstlerhaus Stuttgart, The Shanghai Biennale, The Frankfurter Kunstverein, Artspace New Zealand, The Busan Biennale, MKG Hamburg and many other venues around the world.

The geographical shift in Barakeh’s life – moving from Syria to Europe – resulted in major changes in his practice; originally trained as a painter, he then developed a stronger focus on contemporary art practices, working with a variety of media and topics.

Barakeh is considered a part of a global artivism movement; he approaches creative practices as a tool of social changes – with a strong focus on topics of cultural preservation, he aims to see between the cracks of social and political systems. As a continuation of these creative philosophies outside of the context of his artistic practice, he pursues what he calls a Practice of Necessity - a practice which reacts in response to the pressures, needs, and urgencies of our ever-changing modernity, one that inserts itself directly into political infrastructures. As part of this Practice, he has founded a non-profit organisation called coculture e.V. through which he manages several initiatives, such as SYRIA Cultural Index and the Syrian Biennale, focused on addressing different facets of the challenges faced by displaced cultural producers in the Middle East, Europe and beyond.