Taher Jaoui

Taher Jaoui (b. 1978, Tunis, Tunisia) is an artist who works in painting, mixed media and sculpture. His galleries describe his labour-intensive canvases as carrying on the abstract expressionism of the 1950s and 1960s. Cited influences include "African primitive art", graffiti, glitch art and the COBRA movement. The paintings are large and layered, built up in oil, enamel, spray paint and charcoal. Circles, abstracted skulls and chalkboard-like scribble recur with mathematical signs, linked to his computer science and engineering studies. He likens painting to a dance, shifting the canvas until its elements balance.

Jaoui is self-taught as an artist. Dominos (2022) is a mixed media work on canvas, 180 x 160 cm. Mutants I (2022) is a bronze sculpture in an edition of eight. The diptych Fuis-moi, je te suis (2022) is listed by the Dubai Collection, courtesy of The Salamoun Collection. He has used 3D printing to remake a painting as a sculpture with cartoonish shapes. X-croissances at The LT Gallery, Beirut (2026), is presented as his first move beyond the canvas. Its images show clusters of looped coloured yarn among strokes of paint.

His solo exhibitions include Ghaya Gallery, Tunis (2018), Galerie Kremers, Berlin (2019), and Graham Modern & Contemporary Gallery, Johannesburg (2019). Later solo shows were at Corridor Contemporary, Philadelphia (2022), Qatar Art Center, Doha (2024), and Space 776, New York (2026). Group exhibitions include Enter Art Foundation, Berlin (2017), and Dystopia at Banzy Gallery, Beirut (2019). His work is in the Dubai Collection, the Alfardan Art Collection and the Elie Khouri Art Foundation. Galleries that show his work include Madison Gallery, Solana Beach, and Guy Hepner, New York.