Khadim Ali

Khadim Ali (b. 1978 Quetta, Pakistan; l. Sydney, Australia) grew up in Pakistan as a refugee, before being trained in classical miniature painting at the National College of Arts in Lahore and in mural painting and calligraphy in Tehran. Ali’s paintings tell stories about loss (of his own cultural heritage and of human values) and about how meaning shifts as words and images are perverted through ideological adoption. Selected exhibitions include the Lyon Biennale (2017), the Venice Biennial (2009); Safavid revisited, APT5, Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane (QAGOMA, (2006); British Museum, London; No Country: Contemporary Art for Southeast Asia at the Guggenheim New York (2013) and Documenta 13 (2012). Ali’s work is held in the collections of the National Gallery of Australia, Australian War Memorial, Art Gallery of New South Wales, QAGOMA, Brisbane, Victoria and Albert Museum, London and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. 

Every War is a Defeat 2019
UNSW Art, Design and Architecture, 2019–2024.

Commissioned with the generous support of Bill Manos through ‘Facing Equality’, an initiative of the UNSW Grand Challenge on Inequality, led by Professors Rosalind Dixon and Richard Holden, and supported by UNSW Galleries.

Khadim Ali uses imagery from history, politics, literature, poetry, and mythology to explore contemporary events such as the civil war in Afghanistan and experiences of persecution, displacement, and discrimination.

Every War is a Defeat, 2019 is a public work commissioned with the generous support of Bill Manos through Facing Equality, an initiative of the UNSW Grand Challenge on Inequality, led by Professors Rosalind Dixon and Richard Holden.

Describing the project, Ali said: "Every war infringes the right to life, and therefore, every war is a defeat of humanity... When war is triggered in one area or a human is characterised as a devil, all humankind is vanquished."