Bio

     Sona Bayrami was born in 1997 in the city of Karaj, providence of Tehran, till the age of 14 were her family decides to immigrate to the United States. She completed her bachelor studies in Fine Arts with a concentration in painting at Montclair State University, only a few miles from New York City. Throughout her studies she was fascinated with sculptor and performance art especially due to her background in traditional Persian dance and ballet. Surely, her dance background influences her dynamic and vibrant paintings as well as her performance combined with Traditional Iranian music. She was first introduced to painting at the age of 4 by her mother who was a doctor by day who loved painting nature and beauty in her everyday life. Her interest in painting encouraged her parents to take her to one of the known art academies for youth in Karaj. Her current work is majorly influenced by her Iranian identity and culture. Sona doesn’t identify as an American nor an Iranian, nevertheless she believes living her home behind and rediscovering herself in a new country has been the most crucial point of her personal development. The themes that show up in her work are Movement, self-expression, Persian calligraphy (Nastaligh), and combining past and present cultural influences. She uses gestures of Farsi writing with bold brushstrokes and movement of her body to create her work. The choice of color in her work combined with the gestures of writing aspires to cultivate emotions in her audience, and serve as an aesthetic element not strictly writing. Besides oil paint, she uses acrylic, charcoal, pencils and recycled material to create her work. Her work serves as a piece of memory in time, created by layers and using different mediums.