Riaz Mehmood: Ghazal—Songs for Home

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Riaz Mehmood, "Ishq / Unconditional Love (detail)," 2020

video. Courtesy of the Artist.

This exhibition is a tribute to Riaz Mehmood’s homeland in Kyhber Pakhtunkhwa, along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. In video, photography, painting and textile, Mehmood present moments of memory, joy, syncretism and resilience through an exploration of poetry, song, dance and the landscape. Countering deep-rooted and persistent colonial stereotypes, Ghazal—Songs for Home is a celebration of Pashtun culture and identity in all its complexity and beauty.

Riaz Mehmood is a multidisciplinary artist who uses video, photography and computer programming as his primary means of expression. His practice often visits themes of multiple and fluid identities, geographical, psychological and cultural displacement, magic realism, and the development of knowledge. His ancestral home is a small village located between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Riaz immigrated to Canada in 2000 as a professional engineer and decided to pursue a career in the arts. Riaz holds an MFA from the University of Windsor (2012) and completed the Integrated Media program at the Ontario College of Art and Design (2005). He has participated in several international and national artist residencies and workshops, and has earned numerous grants, scholarships, and awards over the years. Riaz has also been involved with several artist-run centers and served on the boards of SAVAC (Toronto) and articule (Montréal). His works have been shown nationally and internationally.