A Brief Introduction to Azezi and Eli
-- Husband and Wife Uyghur Artists --
Rashida Eli
is an Uyghur-Canadian contemporary artist who graduated from the Chinese Academy of Fine Arts in 1987, majoring in oil painting. Eli's works present a strong figuration practice that engages feminist critique and captures the emotional dispositions of her subjects grounded in the context of Xinjiang, the North-Western region of China. She is best known for painting members of her community with a heavy focus on the "Mother and Child" motif, expressing the inner struggles and empowerment that come with motherhood.
In 2001, together with her husband, Eli held a joint exhibition at the National Art Museum of China. She was one of the artists selected by the Mayshad Foundation to spotlight international female artists. Eli has exhibited her works in the Xinjiang and Guangzhou International Biennales as well as numerous exhibitions in Toronto and Miami. In 2022, thirteen of her works were exhibited in the Beijing 2022 Biennale Special Exhibition - "Sniffing Roses, the Art of Life": Ten International Female Contemporary Artists (Beijing and Shandong).
Eli has been featured in art journals and programs such as MeiShu (Art) (China), MeiShuCongKan (Journal of Art) (China), New Vision (TV), as well as OMNI TV, Hong Kong Asia Television and the Oriental Horizon programme of China Central Television. Her works have been added to the permanent collections of the National Art Museum of China, CAFA Art Museum and the Xinjiang Art Museum. She has been collected throughout England, Canada, Australia, the United States, and China.
Tayfun Belgin, director of Osthaus Museum Hagen, writes in his review:
Eli's works remind German recipients of scenes of Magical Realism, an art movement that emerged in the aftermath of World War I: people who had suffered major setbacks in their existence, poverty spreading, a society that had lost its center. Rashida Eli's line drawings address such limits of social existence in a special way. The people depicted here, even if they are in different circumstances, do not lose their dignity at any time. Their pictorial worlds thematize worlds of inwardness in a masterly way.
Najmidin Azezi
graduated from Xi'an Academy of Fine Arts in 1981, after which he completed a Master's program in oil painting at the Central University for Nationalities in Beijing. Despite the changes in colour, composition, and expression over the years, the theme of Azezi's paintings has always maintained a constant: the spiritual, emotional and physical world of people in their challenging states. Azezi's work, through his bold, broad and simple paint strokes, reflects the turmoil and helplessness in marginalized and vulnerable groups in society, while desperately holding on to the beauty, strength, endurance, and harmony in human nature.
Azezi's work has been seen at the National Art Exhibition (Beijing), Asian Art Festival (Hong Kong), the China Oil Painting Excellence Exhibition (Beijing), the first and second Xinjiang International Biennale, as well as the ninth Guangzhou Biennale. In 2001, together with his wife, Azezi held a joint exhibition at the National Museum of China. His works have entered the permanent collections of the National Museum of China and the Xinjiang Art Museum. Azezi has been featured on OMNI TV Canada, Oriental Horizon programme of China Central Television, Hong Kong Asia Television, and Art Starry Sky, among other art-related programs. Azezi's works have also been included in magazines such as Contemporary Chinese Oil Painting, and Chinese Art. As an Uyghur-Canadian artist, Azezi has been represented by galleries in both China and Canada. His works have been extensively collected in the United States, Canada, and China.
Rashida Eli and Najmidin Azezi currently reside and work in Brockville, Canada.