Life & Work
Baback Tscharandabi was born in Karlsruhe on June 5, 1966. As the child of a German mother and an Iranian father, he was influenced by both cultures and shaped on his path through life.
At fifteen, he found his first artistic expression in music. After trying out various musical projects in the following years, he discovered visual art for himself at 18.
In 1988 Baback Tscharandabi moved to Berlin at the age of 20. Although he couldn’t study art, he wanted to realize his idea of a life with art here. He rented a studio and found peace and time to develop his skill. The studio is for Baback Tscharandabi today, still the center/basis of his work.
Classic painting themes, such as landscape and still life, are the basis of his work. In addition, there is a pure, abstract composition. His paintings and sculptures are unique and lively. The results shown here provide a view of Tscharandabi’s development in recent years.
“By avoiding chance, I do not depend on it and retain the design sovereignty. All my works are
deliberately designed.”
Paintings
The aesthetics of the division of space, the formal design, and the orientation of his works are affirmative.
Surfaces are symmetrically related and correspond in shape, size, and color. Picture elements are mirrored or rhythmically rotated. Foreground and background often have the same value, whereby they cancel each other out, as it were, and manifest themselves anew. The same is true of spatiality, which is rendered only suggestively. As a result, the contents oscillate with one another and appear to be moving as if alive. Pictorial elements combine to form an overall composition that seems straightforward but also allows the viewer new perspectives and vantage points. Therefore, one can discover and read the forms in the works again and again.
The bases of his compositions are exclusively straight lines and circular lines. The coloring is limited to the primary colors, is clear, and restrained in variability.
His works have a very unique aesthetic. One recognizes that they have developed and formed independently from many years of work. Baback Tscharandabi’s results have a unique selling point and are recognizable.
If the first years were characterized by trying out the most diverse materials and painting grounds and the occupation with art theory and philosophy, he began in 1994 with the first large, purposeful block of works.
This block of works, later aptly dubbed the “white phase,” is characterized by pure freehand work, direct design on the painting surface, and a high proportion of white in the color mixture.
In 2007 there was a fundamental paradigm shift in Baback Tscharandabi’s painting. The addition of a ruler and compass and the simultaneous restriction of these two means of design fundamentally changed the expression and composition of his art.
While in the following years, the line as a contour line in the compositions still in the foreground, they shifted the works from the year 2017 on the pure surface. The color mixture also changed. While until 2017, the colors still had a white component mixed in, today, the pure complementary colors dominate the artist’s works.
“I started painting and instantly felt that painting was my medium of expression. It was clear to me that art would become my purpose in life.”
Sculptures
Parallel to the painting and graphic work on paper, Baback Tscharandabi develops his sculptures. These follow in their design and development the same principles as the painting.
In Baback Tscharandabi’s work, both disciplines, painting and sculpture are on an equal footing and influence each other mutually.