Art Is the Language That All Humans Can Understand: Maisara Baroud

“May birds find places to nest again.”

8 min readJul 29, 2024

“We will rebuild ourselves anew,” Palestinian artist and Gaza native Maisara Baroud tells Ask Artists. Having lost his home, studio, pets and the security of his family, he now carries forward his art-making as a means of documentation and to proclaim courageously, “I Am Still Alive” (the name of his latest series of drawings). While most of his days are spent working to secure basic needs and safety for his family, who have moved 10 times and now share temporary group residency, Baroud tries to set aside time each night to draw — a ritual he has said replaces an ongoing scream. In black and white or grayscale, he investigates and incarnates the shape of survival, the voice of witness, the negative space of loss surrounding the bereaved and displaced, and the enduring heart of the “Palestinian Phoenix.”

When possible, amid communication blackouts and the collapse of technology, Baroud shares his works online with his friends and social community. This practice, which Baroud has done for years, takes on new gravity and urgency, as it communicates his continued survival and crucial visual perspective from within the war zone.

“Sadness is a decision postponed until after the war… Drawing, for me, is the way to break the blockade and, in this way, cancel and challenge the borders and the barriers placed by the occupation,” he told The Guardian. Capturing poetically, in real time, the impact of weapons on flesh, and of loss and displacement on souls, Baroud’s abstracted works are elegant, sharp, honest, compassionate and universally accessible. As he told Cairo Scene, his message is, “Gaza, despite its wounds, is still able to give.”

Baroud is an accomplished artist, designer and lecturer, having studied and exhibited internationally. His creative expressions have long depicted universal conflicts and struggles, including war, border violence and illegal detention. Thanks to the help of several artist-colleagues, selections from his most recent series were recreated as murals in Ramallah and the Netherlands. These large-scale presentations highlight the works’ parallels to the Guernica mural. Baroud’s images were also transferred onto transparent papers and displayed on windows at the European Cultural Centre in the Palazzo Mora (alongside but not within the Venice Biennial, which rejected the collection), as part of a, “Foreigners in Their Homeland,” exhibition by Palestinian artists, organized by Palestine Museum U.S.

On Facebook, Baroud shared photos of his friend, Salwa the donkey, whose mother was killed by a “steel bird.” He wrote, “Salwa is crying. Little Salwa doesn’t know how to sulk. But it does make sounds as a failed violinist,” and shared related drawings. Find more of Baroud’s pieces below the Salwa images and following his interview.

5 Questions for the Artist:

1. What is art to you?

Art is the language that all humans can understand, regardless of their spoken languages. Art is the power you possess, enabling you to dominate without the need for force.
Art is the magic that comes from experience, exploration, expertise, practice and, sometimes, play. Art provides you with a lifeline from reality, taking you to other worlds and giving you the absolute freedom to create those worlds as you see.

2. What did you make in the past, and why?

Early on, I discovered my passion for art and pursued it as a specialty. I worked in the field of graphic design and later in interior design, in addition to my work as a lecturer at the College of Fine Arts. During that period, I was drawing, researching, experimenting and exploring my world. I was not as concerned with artistic participation or exhibitions as I was with research, exploration and documenting those experiences for myself.
Nevertheless, I have had 50 artistic participations around the world and seven solo exhibitions discussing humanitarian issues such as illegal immigration across the sea, devastating wars and their resulting deformities on the city’s body, humanity and memory. These works also addressed the concept of occupation and colonization and their effects on the land and people, as well as other subjects such as imprisonment, detention, torture and the longing for freedom.

3. What are you making now, and why?

Right now, I am literally trying to survive the massacre. Since Oct. 7, 2023, we have been living in the shadow of a brutal war of extermination, and my only concern since that day has been to survive a death that could come at any moment. I try to express this state through drawing and publishing in a series of diaries that I share with friends and followers via social media. The series is titled, “I Am Still Alive,” documenting human stories and scenes of displacement, killing, destruction, brokenness, patience, resilience, sorrow, pain and fresh death. I aim to narrate the story as it is, away from the official narrative and propaganda.

4. What are your hopes for the future?

I’ll be realistic in my answer. Amid this massive destruction, daily killings and genocide, and surrounded by millions of tons of rubble, misery and darkness, I do not see a bright future in the near term. However, the legend of the Palestinian Phoenix cannot end. We believe in it, and we will rise again, living from the heart of death and rebuilding anew. The planes destroyed my office, and later they destroyed my house and studio. I lost all my artistic archives and experiences, my art library containing three thousand books, thousands of manuscripts, sketches, and dozens of personal and prized paintings.
The war will end soon, and I will rebuild what I have lost. I will produce new works once calm prevails and we live a life without demolition, killing, death and displacement. A peaceful and stable life for my children and my people, where peace prevails by restoring rights to their rightful owners.

5. What else would you like to say?

I wish the world could see the truth as it is, not as the occupation portrays it. This is what I try to convey in my daily drawings, serving as witnesses to the massacre. I strive to depict the reality and the tragedy we live and endure, capturing the daily scenes artistically and sharing them with friends and followers.
War will come to an end. Wars are temporary circumstances that will not endure forever. We are a people who love life and strive to live it honorably. Despite the tragedies we have gone through and continue to face, we will rebuild ourselves anew. I hope the war ends soon and that we reclaim our stolen rights. I hope we can rebuild our city and bring life back to its streets and alleys.
May the sea regain its blue hue, and may birds find places to nest again, away from a life intertwined with continuous and fresh death.

Artist Supplied Bio:

Maisara Baroud is a visual artist from Gaza City. He was born in 1976. Maisara received his Bachelor in 1998 and, in 2011, he obtained a Master of Fine Arts. In addition to his artworks and exhibitions, he has worked as a lecturer at the Fine Arts College at Al-Aqsa University (this school was bombed and destroyed). Black-and-white dichotomy takes over Maisara’s art practice. Using his own techniques, he attempts to shape suffering in works with a human dimension. It is an aesthetic cry that describes what people suffer in different parts of the world and the Palestinian suffering in particular.

Mr. Baroud’s works are concerned with humanitarian issues and how to express them artistically (wars, immigration, political prisoners, and illegal arrests and occupation, among other issues). Maisara’s works are reflections of dramatic and tragic scenes dominated by the meanings of grief, sadness, death, violence, weakness, war, peace, hope, freedom and lightness, in an attempt to show life intertwined with fresh and continuous death. Maisara has participated in many local and international group exhibitions: more than 40 in Palestine, France, America, Japan, Italy, Russia, Qatar, Cairo, Algeria, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Lebanon, Jordan, Tunisia, Kuwait and Canada. Mr. Baroud has had 7 solo exhibitions, as follows:
• “Rita and the rifle” Gaza 2004
• “White phosphorous for the birth of Elia ” Cairo, Algeria and Gaza 2009
• “Glimmer flash” Algeria 2009
• “Salt Boats” Bethlehem 2019
• “Rubble” French Institute in Gaza 2021
• “Existence” Online Exhibition Art Scoops 2021
• “I’m still alive” Zawyeh Gallery- Ramallah 2024