In her recent series, Silent Generation, Kiany explores feelings of nostalgia in relation to the layered realities of contemporary life. Often incorporating self-representations situated within familiar childhood environments, her paintings evoke a tension between a longing for the past and a desire to reimagine the future. By drawing on the joy, simplicity, and energy of childhood, Kiany proposes a way of moving through adulthood that embraces memory as a source of renewal rather than retreat.
Within the paintings, familiar scenes unfold: a vivid orange swing recedes into the background as a girl runs freely in the foreground, brimming with carefree energy; in another, a bright yellow Ferris wheel rises behind three joyful adult figures who leap and play beneath a clear sky. Kiany reimagines these subjects through the carefree rhythms and emotional textures of her early memories, allowing joy and movement to surface—reclaiming the fearless vitality of childhood as a way of facing uncertainty with resilience
and hope.
The Lunar New Year—marking the Year of the Horse and the theme Brave the Wind—resonates deeply with this sense of momentum and transformation. The horse symbolizes courage, speed, and a bold charge into the unknown—qualities echoed in the running girl and leaping figures that populate Kiany’s paintings.
In this Lantern City installation, Kiany invites viewers to pause amid the glowing lanterns and carry forward a spark of the same playful, brave energy into the new year.
Golnaz Kiany (b. 1988, Iran) is an Iranian-Canadian figurative artist. She holds a BA in Painting from Sooreh University, Tehran (2013). Her training includes mentorship in figurative painting under acclaimed Iranian master painter Mehrdad Mohebali, which has strongly informed her approach to the human figure, gesture, and movement. Her practice engages with universal themes of memory, time, and identity, reflecting her personal negotiations with the experience of loss and belonging. Over the past decade, Kiany’s work has been exhibited in Tehran, London, Toronto, Vancouver, and New York. She currently lives and works in Vancouver, BC.
The Orange Swing & Illusion
In her recent series, Silent Generation, Kiany explores feelings of nostalgia in relation to the layered realities of contemporary life. Often incorporating self-representations situated within familiar childhood environments, her paintings evoke a tension between a longing for the past and a desire to reimagine the future. By drawing on the joy, simplicity, and energy of childhood, Kiany proposes a way of moving through adulthood that embraces memory as a source of renewal rather than retreat.
Within the paintings, familiar scenes unfold: a vivid orange swing recedes into the background as a girl runs freely in the foreground, brimming with carefree energy; in another, a bright yellow Ferris wheel rises behind three joyful adult figures who leap and play beneath a clear sky. Kiany reimagines these subjects through the carefree rhythms and emotional textures of her early memories, allowing joy and movement to surface—reclaiming the fearless vitality of childhood as a way of facing uncertainty with resilience
and hope.
The Lunar New Year—marking the Year of the Horse and the theme Brave the Wind—resonates deeply with this sense of momentum and transformation. The horse symbolizes courage, speed, and a bold charge into the unknown—qualities echoed in the running girl and leaping figures that populate Kiany’s paintings.
In this Lantern City installation, Kiany invites viewers to pause amid the glowing lanterns and carry forward a spark of the same playful, brave energy into the new year.
Golnaz Kiany (b. 1988, Iran) is an Iranian-Canadian figurative artist. She holds a BA in Painting from Sooreh University, Tehran (2013). Her training includes mentorship in figurative painting under acclaimed Iranian master painter Mehrdad Mohebali, which has strongly informed her approach to the human figure, gesture, and movement. Her practice engages with universal themes of memory, time, and identity, reflecting her personal negotiations with the experience of loss and belonging. Over the past decade, Kiany’s work has been exhibited in Tehran, London, Toronto, Vancouver, and New York. She currently lives and works in Vancouver, BC.
The Lantern City is grateful to be held on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish peoples of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam Indian Band), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish Nation), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh Nation). We acknowledge our privilege to be gathered on this land, and commit to work with and be respectful to the Indigenous peoples whose arts and stories inspire us to bring communities together.
