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Nargess Jalali Delia
Painter
Vancouver, BC, Canada
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I have always loved art and enjoyed creativity since a very young age. Growing up in a multicultural and multilingual family, I was given the opportunity to indulge in the richness and diversity of the cultures and the cities that I grew up in. I was born in Montreal in 1981, to an American Mom from an Italian background and an Iranian Dad; we traveled and moved frequently while I was growing up. I spent the first 5 years of my life in sunny California, and remember being drawn to the beautiful surrounding nature and being mesmerized by the beauty of the ocean. We then moved to Iran where I spent the rest of my childhood and adolescent years, and was fascinated with the brilliance of Persian art, architecture, history, music and poetry.
Traveling has always been my passion and the cities that I’ve visited have influenced my art immensely. I’ve enjoyed traveling to some beautiful cities throughout Iran and worldwide, which have dazzled me and inspired me in many ways. Visiting Italy in my twenties provided me with the opportunity to connect with my Italian roots and to be captivated by the charm of Florence, Venice and Rome. Continuing visiting delightful cities throughout Europe such as Barcelona and Paris have always given me the feeling of coming alive artistically. However, I feel a special connection with Middle Eastern art and have found myself to be enchanted and exhilarated by the poetic beauty that I encountered in the art, music, architecture and poetry of the Middle East; in particular in the cities of Isfahan, Shiraz, Damascus, Istanbul and Byblos and Baalbek of Lebanon.
Art has always been my go to, a personal place to meditate, to let go and to express and create. Art has also been my way of dealing with trauma in my life, of choosing love and beauty over fear and darkness. My degree in Psychology and social work have helped me to be able to find my inspirations and to be able to connect with others. Yet, my art has mostly been private, and even though it’s played such a vital role in my personal journey, it mainly remained as an individual hobby. However my son’s recent diagnosis with Type 1 diabetes (an autoimmune disease which targets mostly children and destroys the insulin producing cells in the pancreas) gave me the motivation and courage to share my art with an audience larger than friends and family, putting up my art for auction for the first time and raising funds for the cure of this disease.
Recently I’ve come to combine my two passions of Persian art and poetry by creating a unique form of calligraphy and mixing it with colourful expressions on canvas. I use different media such as acrylic, vitrail and water-colour. By adding natural stones and elements, I try to bring the harmony of nature to my paintings. I continue to draw inspiration from the world around us, both the nature and man-made art and literature. My passion for traveling continues to provide me with the chance to connect, expand and to enrich my art. Having currently settled in Vancouver, where my husband and I are raising our 3 children, I feel blessed to be surrounded by the beauty of this city and its captivating nature, which inspires my art every day. I believe that we all have an artist within us, waiting to tell a story, and that each art piece carries a story, a message, and a universal human connection, regardless of lingual or cultural barriers, and I hope that you will enjoy connecting with mine.
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