Mo Kalache | Artist at Mondoir

Nationality: Spanish

Discipline: painting

Based in: Barcelona, ES

Biography

Mo Kalache is a Beirut-born, Barcelona-based painter whose practice emerged from a need to create anchoring symbols in times of sadness. Growing up amid Beirut's cycles of beauty and destruction shaped his understanding of art as both witness and balm, a way to hold joy and grief simultaneously. His visual language draws from Islamic art, Arabic calligraphy, ancient mythologies, and Arab heritage, fused with the chromatic intensity of psychedelia, the spiritual iconography of Eastern and Western mysticism, and the gestural freedom of contemporary street art. Large-scale canvases radiate bold gradients and calligraphic gesture, populated by recurring motifs: suns, felines, alchemical marks, that began in personal journals and meditation and evolved into a vocabulary he returns to across bodies of work. Mo holds a BA and MA in Illustration from the Lebanese Academy of Fine Arts (ALBA) in Beirut. His work has been exhibited in Beirut, Barcelona, Madrid, and Costa Rica, and published in Art Seen Magazine under the curatorial direction of Gita Joshi. His paintings are collected by those drawn to work that balances aesthetic boldness with contemplative depth.

Artist Statement

I create paintings as modern rituals, transforming symbolism, language, and emotion into vibrant portals. The sun is the anchor of my practice: trickster, guide, and witness. It navigates the full spectrum of consciousness, sometimes vulnerable, sometimes powerful, sometimes consumed. Accompanied by feline figures, calligraphic gesture, and alchemical marks that function as visual mantras, bridging the playful and the profound. I draw from ancient mythologies, cosmology, Islamic art tradition, and pre-monotheistic symbolism, not as literal belief, but as evidence that consciousness has always been a storyteller seeking meaning in light and darkness. These traditions arrive in my work alongside the very present tensions of today: the battles we witness on our screens, in our cities, in our bodies. My paintings document this threshold, how we remain grounded in ourselves while witnessing all of this. How we protect our brightness without denying the dark. Painting, for me, is a sacred act of return. The studio is where I ground myself, where emotion becomes form, where color holds what language cannot. I want my paintings to be offerings cosmic and intimate, timeless and urgently now, inviting viewers to pause, feel, and remember their own inner light.

Exhibitions

Galleria Handers, Madrid, Spain PAAM Gallery, Barcelona, Spain Envision Festival, Costa Rica Art Scene Gallery, Beirut, Lebanon

Awards

Art Seen Magazine — Published work, curated by Gita Joshi

Education

Lebanese Academy of Fine Arts (ALBA), Beirut, Lebanon Master of Arts (MA), Art & Art Direction Bachelor of Arts (BA), Illustration Master's in Strategic Design: IED Madrid