Massoud Hayoun explores food symbolism and liberation politics in personal paintings

Los Angeles-based painter Massoud Hayoun discusses his use of food as symbolic language in his artistic practice. He explains that food serves as both inspiration and pain, noting how cooking brik for his grandmother contributed to her death after gallbladder surgery. Hayoun critiques the limitations of food iconography like watermelons for Palestine, referencing his work The Master's Tools and Audre Lorde. He frequently depicts family members, including his stateless mother and grandfather without papers, connecting personal history to political themes. The artist examines dining tables as symbols of home and their destruction in works like Anatomy of a Raid (2025), addressing ICE raids and family politics. Hayoun reflects on his grandmother's laborious hospitality within male domination and uses harissa to represent subversion of autocracy. He acknowledges painting's bourgeois nature while continuing to create symbolic works about urgent global horrors.