Shifting his focus to the plight of children in the Syrian war, Amr Fahed explains: ‘’In 2014, I decided to go back to Syria to stay side by side, next to the children in the refugee camps. I decided to go back and capture the sadness in their eyes, and send it to the world through images, and photos of their faces.’’
Born in Soueida, Amr Fahed (1982) graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts, Damascus University in 2007. In his depictions of scenes from the war, he aims to explore “the expression of any experience, or of any aspect of the human condition.” Although he works in diverse media, such as painting, photography and digital art, he ultimately gained recognition through his digital images on Syrian children growing up in camps.
By reworking his photographs, Fahed adds layers of meaning to them. The resulting black and white images are scratched, outlined and redrawn. In the process, sometimes the faces disappear or are highlighted; children turn into angels or birds transform into planes. By bringing the reality of the photograph into a fictional world, the layered images hint at his perspective of the scene or people.
Fahed has exhibited his work in group and solo exhibitions at venues such as 4 Walls Art Gallery in Dubai and the Alfa Gallery, Domar Culture Center and Al Keshle Gallery in Damascus and the Sharjah Islamic Arts Festival.