Ismail Khayat was born in 1944 in Khanaqin. He graduated from Ba'quba Teachers College. From 1992 to 1998 he was the Director of Art in the Ministry of Culture of the Kurdistan Regional Government.
The artist, who was a member of the World Artists Association, has opened 45 exhibitions in his career. One of his most famous works was painting the stones of Pirar village (the site of the battle between the PUK and KDP in Degala district) in protest against the civil war and in support of peace.
Ismail Khayat, an artist with an old history, had his own innovations and characteristics in the art of painting; somehow, among hundreds of paintings, this artist's paintings offer you their own identity.
In his exhibitions, wherever he was, he exhibited his latest creative paintings, telling the story of black and white fish, the story of the rocks of the hills, the ears of water, and the journeys of birds. That is why his paintings constantly attract the attention and admiration of his audience.
Character Designer: Hemn Qaremani
Ismail Khayat has always lived with his artistic dreams, a dream that has crossed Kurdish borders and entered the world through the gates of art with the sorrows, tragedies, joys, and nature of his Kurdistan.
When we look at Ismail Khayat's black and white drawings, we come across a number of different interpretations, all of which are based on two different dimensions. The first is whether this artist wants to define the black surface with white lines. Secondly, blacks cannot be ignored in white spaces.
Masks were one of the techniques that were present in Ismail Khayat's art. In each of them, he showed us an event and a face, introduced us to peace, and cursed us for war. The masks talked about a friend or an enemy, and all of them were reading life to us.
His artistic career was more than half a century and he opened exhibitions in many countries around the world, in each of which he innovatively described the restoration of life through the use of various means of expression.
Ismail Khayat was quietly a voice full of shouting. In the war between the PUK and KDP, he turned the brush into a battlefield and filled the isolated borders with paint. He left a number of doves of peace on the rocks of Pirar to watch over the warring brothers.
With his silence, Ismail Khayat's message and art reached Asia, and the Japanese were eager to exhibit his paintings in their galleries. Not only that but they printed them on their blouses and t-shirts!
He passed away on Thursday 2022/10/20 in Sulaimani.
Ismail Khayat was from Khanaqin, a southern part of Kurdistan. Alwan water brought him from Khanaqin, settled in Sulaimani, and became a brush, color, and message. Kurds will always be proud of Ismail.
