Nahid Hagigat

Artist Biography

Nahid Hagigat is a visual artist who combines her paintings with her own life stories. After graduating in Fine Arts from Tehran University, Nahid continued her studies in the United States. She received her Ph.D. from New York University in Art and Art Education, specializing in painting and printmaking. She often exhibited her art in Tehran and was instrumental in introducing printmaking to Tehran art galleries. She recently received her second Ph.D. from Huntington Pacific University in Art & Behavioral Therapy.

Nahid has had multiple solo and group exhibitions in the United States. In addition, her work is in numerous private and public collections including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The British Museum, Tehran Museum of Modern Art, JP Morgan-Chase, New York University, and World Bank in Washington, D.C. among others. 

Artist Statement

I started my professional career during the 1970s in New York. During this time, I created a series of etchings and photo-etchings depicting Iranian women and children, among other subjects. In these series, I portrayed figures showing power and resistance. Sometimes, the main figure is repeated many times, each representing a different stage of being. During the 1980s and beyond, I shifted to a different subject matter, creating paintings on canvas influenced by nature, such as dry leaves of palm trees and bare branches. I explored the intensity and force of branches against light, expressing complexity, music, synchronization, harmony, and grace.

In 2015, I began printing my etching plates from the 1970s era in only black color and decided to paint on them with colors. I call this series “hand-painted etchings.” I selected four plates mainly focusing on the subject of women. Choosing these specific plates, my goal is not to depict a “victim,” but rather a woman for whom strength and
passion for life surpasses her entanglement with oppression. The women in my etchings embrace aliveness and a willingness to thrive as they achieve their next level of greatness. Flowers are powerful symbols of resistance and that is why my “women” are showered with
them. Flowers symbolize beauty, innocence, power, purity, peace, fertility, divinity, eternity, and love. Some are delicate, some are rough, some are short-lived, some are long, but all in their unique ways radiate an irreplaceable energy. As with my “women,” they each have
their own story to tell. Every print has been transformed and has taken on a new life and momentum of its own.