Composed of works titled "Canine," "Hounds of War," and "Hounded," Canine—as its name suggests—is a series of paintings that revolve around, and reflect upon, dogs and, in particular, their capacity for aggression. The canine has long been a common subject in the artist's work, which features the animal in a variety of contexts and mediums. However, upon observing the ways in which American military personnel used dogs to intimidate detainees in Iraq's infamous Abu Ghraib prison, the artist began to perceive the animal as an instrument of cruelty. Characterized by their abstract style, rough brushstrokes, and bold, vivid palettes—which at times replicate the colors and patterns of military fatigues—these paintings construct a reality that is inherently threatening and which speaks directly to the brutalities of war, detention, and occupation.

Iraqi-Kurdish painter and sculptor Serwan Baran was born in Baghdad in 1968. When he was just two years old, the Iraqi army began launching military operations to suppress the movement for Kurdish autonomy. As he notes, his country has since continued to be a theater of uninterrupted violence. Baran fled to Amman, Jordan in the aftermath of the 2003 American invasion of Iraq, a moment that marked a decisive juncture in his career and artistic identity. As Baran has delineated, his work became "more emotional and expressionist" as he began to grapple with his own collection of experiences as a conscripted soldier and "war artist" throughout the 1980s and 90s. Yet, as he is keen to make clear, his art "his a reaction to war, not a chronicle."

In his exhibit "Fatherland" for example, Baran comments on the masculine and paternalistic dimensions of politics and warfare in Iraq by highlighting what he calls the "chauvinistic image of strength" that dictatorial leaders have historically projected "hrough brutality and dominance." His large-scale paintings, which have arguably become his signature medium, provide the locus in which he exorcises the horrific scenes and images that have accumulated in his consciousness. As he readily acknowledges, however, it is a process: I am repeating the shock over and over again, to rid myself of the nightmare. Baran currently splits his time between Amman and Beirut, Lebanon.