Biography • Zeigam Azizov

Zeigam Azizov is British artist and philosopher. He was born on the 13th of April 1963 in the former USSR, (Azerbaijan SSR) and currently lives and works in London (UK). His work addresses questions of time, image and the narrative procedures of globalisation with the languages of migration, media and the new mimesis. He uses material that resembles means of writing and media images and transforming them into the conceptual art to comment on the philosophical elaboration of the technologically constructed time.

He was trained in art, philosophy and cultural theory in the UK, France and Austria. He completed his studies in philosophy in England in the early 1990s, what he couldn’t receive in the former Soviet Union for ideological reasons, although initially planned to devote himself to philosophy completely. Later he started his PhD in philosophy first at Goldsmiths University of London (UK) and completed at the Klagenfurt University(Austria) with the thesis on the French philosopher Bernard Stiegler’s work and a philosophical exploration of images.

Since the middle of 1980s actively involved in the art world, exhibiting and publishing his work as well as developing the body of work which brings together his philosophical interests. Taking his artistic studies as a philosophical activity , ‘art as philosophy, philosophy as art’, he has exhibited and written texts about his projects extensively.

He is one of the pioneering artists to study the ‘migration paradigm’ as a novel understanding of the movement of globalization and space-time relationships, what he calls ‘migrasophia’ (migration+philosophy). Since 1993 this project was partly made in the collaboration with the cultural theorist Stuart Hall, who became a close friend and collaborator.

He exhibited his work worldwide, including most recently: the Venice Biennale (Azerbaijan pavilion, 2019, 2011 and the main exhibiton of the Venice Biennale ,2003 (Utopia Station)), Tate Modern, London, UK (2006), House der Kunst, Munich, Germany (2004), Grazer Kunstverein, Graz, Austria (2002), and TN Probe, Tokyo, Japan (2001) among others.

As a part of his practice he has been lecturing and teaching in different universities including the University of California, Central St.Martin’s College of Art and Design, Goldsmiths University of London, Vienna Academy of Art and the University of Aberdeen, University of Klagenfurt, Middlesex University. He also lectured worldwide in galleries and museums.

Selected Reviews

2024-Matthias Michalka, Foreword to the catalogue: Avant-Garde and Liberation: Contemporary Art and Decolonial Modernism, MUMOK, Vienna

2023-Mark Nash, Curating The Moving Image, Normal Films/Duke University Press

2023-Maja Ciric (MC Presento, Belgrade), Interview with Zeigam Azizov about fuzzy ontology, (Audio), Belgrade

2022-Sara Raza, Punk Orientalism, Black Dog Press, London

2020-Wakana Kono, Art Scene, Baku // BT, 02.(vol.72. No.1080) p.188-189, Tokyo, Japan

2019-Niccolò Lucarelli , Il Demone DellaTechnologia, Artribune

2019-Martelletto, N., L’Arte Esalta Venezia, Cultura, Venice

2016-Dilara Vagabova, Notes on Zeigam Azizov’s art, Yol magazine, Baku

2014-Hans Ulrich Obrist, Ways of Curating, Penguin

2013-Anne Seaman, The Beginning of Thinking Is Geometric reimagines maths through contemporary art, The National

2013Marion Hohlfeldt, Betwixt and Between: Displacement and liminality, Interventions journal

2012-Yasmine Allam, Being Contemporary, is Not Cutting off the past,

2012-Sara Raza, ‘Migrasophia’ (Migration + Philosophy), (catalogue essay), Maraya Art Centre, Al Gasba, Sharjah

2011-Lee Sharrock, Biennale Bedlam, FADWEBSITE

2011-Milena Placentile, The 54th Venice Biennale, akimbo.ca,

2011-Lockwood Smith, From Bangladesh to Azerbaijan, artlog.com

2011-Ilary Valbonesi, Interview with Zeigam Azizov

2011-Ferhat Senetci, Machine Raum, http://videoistanbul.blogspot.com

2010-Mark Nash, Re-imagining October, Calvert 22

2009-Michaela Monschein, Erdol und Kunst, artpool, Vienna

2008-Marion Hohfeldt, Attitudes urbaines: Espaces contrôlés et déplacements artistiques, Nouvelle revue d’esthétique, France

2007-Hedwig Saxenbuher and Christian Kravagna, Media Use, Kunstraum Lakeside, Klagenfurt

2007-Joaquin Barrendios Rodriguez, El Arte Global y Las politicas de la novidad, Luminar, vol.V, n 001, Mexico

2007-Joaquin Barriendios Rodriguez, Global Art and politics of mobility: (Trans) cultural shifts in the international contemporary art-system, Medewerker, Amsterdam

2007-Wirtschaftliches Buchstabieren, Karntner Tageszeitung, Klagenfurt

2007-Christian Kravagna, General Travel Conditions, in Routes, Revolver books, Germany

2006-Stuart Hall, Three ‘Moments’ in Post-war History, Oxford Journals, History Workshop Journal

2006-Laure Philipse, “Der wereld als ‘a global village’, 8 weekly, Amsterdam,

2005-Trading Places, Variant, summer issue

2005-Johannes Wendland, Dot.City ladt sich aug, Frankfurter Rundshau,

2003-Brigitte Huck, Routes, Artforum, May

2003-Hans Ulrich Obrist, Molly Hesbit, Rirkrit Tiravanija, What is the station, Venice Biennale catalogue

2002-Mattias Dusini,Anders Reisen, Springerin

2002-Reinhard Braun, Kunst zwischen Cultural Studies und Politik, Camera Austria, 80

2002-Walter Seidl, Auf der Reise, Arts Magazine

https://www.halem-verlag.de/the-time-of-the-image/

https://www.iniva.org/library/digital-archive/people/a/azizov-zeigam/

https://uni-klu.academia.edu/ZeigamAzizov