Introduction
Jwan Yosef (born September 6th, 1984) is a Syrian-born London-based, Swedish painter and artist. He specializes in plastic arts and is based in London, England.
Early life and education
Yosef was born in Ras al-Ayn, Syria, to a Kurdish father and an Armenian Christian mother. His family immigrated to Sweden when he was two years old, and later he studied painting in Pernby School of Painting in Stockholm between 2004 and 2006, then moved to Konstfack University College of Arts, Crafts and Design, Stockholm.
Career
Yosef has taken part in a great number of art fairs and group exhibitions. He held two solo exhibitions in 2013 titled Painting about Sex, Flesh and Violence, lol at the DIVUS Gallery in London and High Notes, at the Galleri Anna Thulin, Stockholm. He participated in the Threadneedle Prize exhibition in 2013 and the BEERS Contemporary Award for Emerging Art both in 2013. In 2015 he exhibited at Galleri Bon with group exhibition There and Back Again with fellow Konstfack graduates Josef Bull, Petr Davydtchenko and Natasja Loutchko. He is a founding member and studio holder at The Bomb Factory Art Foundation in Archway, North London.
Personal life
Yosef is of Kurdish and Armenian ancestry. He is openly gay. In April 2016, during the amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research gala in São Paulo, Brazil, he publicly announced that he had been in a relationship with Puerto Rican singer Ricky Martin. The couple married in 2017. On December 31, 2018, Martin and Yosef announced, via Instagram, the birth of their daughter, Lucia Martin-Yosef. On October 29, 2019, Martin and Yosef announced the birth of their son, Renn Martin-Yosef.