Omid Mehdizadeh

Omid Mehdizadeh

Omid Mehdizadeh was born in 1983 in Tehran. He has held 7 solo exhibitions and has participated in more than 30 foreign and domestic group exhibitions. Mehdizadeh was selected as the top artist in Germany’s Hans Christian Anderson Award in 2002, and won the photography and poster design award at Vienna Independent Shorts in 2006.


“Block B2”

If you are a photographer, looking for something in the city, it is only obvious: buildings, people, or whatever belongs to it, will be in front of your lens. If you are not after anything in the city, you will end up in nature.
I have taken pictures in nature many times, only to be away from the city. When I went back to those photos, I still saw a trace of the city, which was unpleasant to me. What caught my attention more than anything else was not mountains, trees, and rivers, but posts, building materials, and construction wastes.
For years, when I set foot on a path to go to nature, the city comes along with me. So I do not feel homesick! They are all over the place: stores for selling building materials, posts that are driven into the ground like nails, and piled-up concrete blocks.
Ekbatan Complex, B2 block, this vast concrete volume, is where I have lived in. I did not expect to see its pieces out in the midst of nature and my pictures.
Omid Mehdizadeh
2016

Omid Mehdizadeh, “Block B2”, installation, mix material (cement, plaster, iron, wood, expanded clay, plastic, dried plant, gravel, sand, rebar), various sizes, 2016
Omid Mehdizadeh, “Episode 01: Prolongation” a group exhibition, installation view, 2016