Ali Banisadr was born in 1976 in Tehran, Iran. As a child he moved with his family to California and later attended the School of Visual Arts, New York, until 2005 and the New York Academy of Art, where he graduated in 2007. He had his first solo exhibition in 2008 at Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects in New York.

Banisadr’s work is characterized by dreamlike, hallucinatory and often chaotic landscapes. This theme is inspired by childhood memories, imaginary scenes, the history of painting and sound. Banisadr has synaesthesia (the ability to experience sound visually). As a small boy during the Iran-Iraq war, Banisadr moved to create a visual understanding of the sounds of explosions and air raids. These internal sounds guide his traces on the canvas and the plate to create layered compositions of disordered shapes and figures.

Ali Banisadr is one of those artists who are interested in a wide range of literature, philosophy and music. His Persian roots play a rather unconscious role in his work.
The painter is also fascinated by the German philosophers Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche. Ali Banisadr was inspired for the present work by Hieronymus Bosch.

SOLO EXHIBITIONS:

2023
Ali Banisadr “The Changing Past” Victoria Miro, London
Princeton University Art Museum: Display of “Return to Mother”, Mathey College Common Room, Princeton, NJ

2022
“Return to Mother”, Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris

2021
“These Specks of Dust”, Kasmin, NY
“Beautiful Lies”, Museo Stefano Bardini and
Palazzo Vecchio, Florence, Italy

2020
“Ali Banisadr /Matrix 185”, Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, CT
“Ultramarinus-Beyond the Sea”, Benaki Museum, Athens, Greece

2019
“Ordered Disorders”, Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris
“Bosch & Banisadr, Ali Banisadr: We work in shadows”, Gemäldegalerie, Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, AT
“Foreign Lands: Ali Banisadr”, Het Noordbrabants Museum,’s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands
“Micro-Macro: Ali Banisadr & Andrew Sendor”, MOCA Jacksonville, FL, US

2018
“The World Upside Down”, BlainSouthern, Berlin

2013
“Love Me/ Love Me Not”, Contemporary Art from Azerbaijan and its Neighbors, The 55th International Art Exhibition, Venice Biennale,Venice, Italy
“Expanded Painting”, Prague Biennale 6, Prague, Czech Republic
“Cinematic Visions: Painting at The Edge of Reality”, Victoria Miro Gallery, London, UK
“A Selection of Recent Acquisitions from The Permanent Collection”, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA
Safar/Voyage, Museum of Anthropology(MOA) at The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada (Curated by Fereshteh Daftari)
Frauen Liebe und Leben (The Klöcker collection) at the Lehmbruck Museum , Duisburg, Germany
Disaster: The End of Days, Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Pantin, France
Tectonic , The Moving Museum, Gate Village DIFC, Dubai
Dynasty, Hotel Particulier, New York, NY (Curated by Omar-Lopez Chahoud)

2012
“Contemporary Iranian art in the Permanent Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (March-September)
Peekskill Project V, Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art, Peekskill, NY (Curated by Livia Straus & Lilly Wei)
The Sound of Painting , Palazzo Saluzzo Paesana, Turin, Italy (Curated by Margherita Artoni)
Lucie Fontaine: Estate Vernissage, Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York
Hue and Cry, Sotheby’s (S2 Gallery) New York, NY; (Curated by Vladimir Restoin Roitfeld)
Referencing History, Green Art Gallery, Dubai (curated by Jane Neal)

2011
XXSmall, Gemeente Museum, The Hague, Netherlands
East Ex East, Brand New Gallery, Milan, Italy (Curated by Jane Neal)
Visions, Monica De Cardenas, Milan, Italy

2010
Hareng Saur : Ensor and Contemporary Art, Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (SMAK), Ghent, Belgium
Contemporary Notes, Assar Gallery, Tehran, Iran (Curated by Vahid Sharifian)
Ghosts, Luce Gallery, Torino, Italy

2009
Epic Painting (Ali Banisadr, Charles Browning, Robert Colescott, Julie Heffernan, Laurie Hogin, Nicky Nodjoumi), Samek Art Gallery, Bucknell University, Lewisberg, PA
Raad O Bargh- Kunstraum Deutsche Bank, Salzburg, Austria
Unveiled: New Art from the Middle East, The Saatchi Gallery, London
Raad O Bargh – 17 Artists from Iran, Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris

2008
Weaving The Common Thread, Queens Museum of Art, Queens, NY
Utopia Dystopia, Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects, New York
Small is Beautiful (2), Flowers Gallery, New York
Post Graduate Fellows Exhibition, New York Academy of Art

2007
Small is Beautiful, Flowers Gallery, New York
Homecoming, New York Academy of Art, New York
CAA Exhibition, Hunter College/Time Square Gallery, New York

2006
Tribeca Ball, Skylight, New York
Summer Painters, Chateau de Balleroy, France

2005
In Exile, Visual Arts Gallery, New York