Nasser Hussein paints in earthy yellows and browns and slightly cooler grays. Shades of almond, ecru, bistre, beaver, chocolate, russet, rust, sand, liver, taupe, walnut, and slate gray, with occasional dashes of citron produce a warmth in tone which belies the detachment in subject matter. Hussein paints faceless and anonymous, distant, almost impersonal human figures. Captured off-guard (as if by a camera) in peripheral moments of the everyday, time moves, though slowly. In an absurdist impulse, the individual is caught alone in moments of imaginary identification or utter stultification. Produced with acrylics and watercolors, Hussein’s surface appears powdery and matte; flat, though perspectival space is maintained so that the lone figure in each painting appears to exist in a vacuum – a self-enclosed world in which human activity is denaturalized and mirrored back to us.

Nasser Hussein was born in Aleppo, Syria in 1971. He received his degree in Fine Art from the Damascus University in Syria in 1997, and furthered his studies in Germany, first at the Siegen University between 2003 and 2004, and then at the Düsseldorf Academy of Art between 2004 and 2006. Between 2002 and 2006, he had a scholarship from KAAD (Katholischer Akademischer Ausländer-Dienst). In 2001 he participated in both the Cairo Biennial in Egypt and the Lattakia Biennial in Syria. He partook in group shows at Art-Lab Berlin (2017), Hilbert Raum in Berlin (2016), Villa Ichon in Bremen (2016), Meem Gallery in Dubai (2013), Galerie Tanit in Beirut (2012), Mashrabia Gallery in Cairo (2011), among others in Aleppo, Amman, Bonn, Brussels, Damascus, Düsseldorf, Cologne, and Istanbul. His solo exhibitions were held at Pier Boulez Saal in Berlin (2018), Karim Gallery in Amman (2015 & 2008), Atassi Gallery in Damascus (2008), the Culture

Department of Bonn in Germany (2004), and the Museum of Bad Berleburg in Germany (2004), among others. Hussein has lived and worked in Berlin since 2012.