Ehsan Fardjadniya (Iraans-Koerdistan, Iran, 1980) is performance- en beeldend kunstenaar.
He was exiled from Iran in 2000 due to his political cartoons, after which he applied for asylum in the Netherlands. He studied at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague and has a Master in Fine Arts from Goldsmiths’ College in London. Art and activism coalesce in Fardjadniya’s work, for which his “politicized” body—as a political exile and man of color—forms the starting point. His personal experiences and struggles with institutional racism filter through in the poignant stories about migration that he tells.
Raul Balai (Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1980), a.k.a. el bastardo, is an artist whose focus lies in themes such as cultural clashes, hybridity, exchanges, and transformations.
He is inspired by popular culture and politics, as well as through music and art. The visual vocabulary and conceptual framework Balai utilizes is shaped by the interplay of painting, graffiti, graphic design, illustration, and photography. Balai studied at the University of the Arts Utrecht and has been a member of various collectives and partnerships as an artist.