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| Iraqi artists regaining the future
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By Karen Dabrowska
Reoccupy the sky with our dreams, regain the future with our imagination. That is the ambitious aim of Iraqi artists after the downfall of Saddam Hussein.
An explosion of bright colours greeted visitors to London’s Aya Gallery, the venue of Expressions of Hope: Iraqi Art, an exhibition of the works of artists in exile who are building bridges of co-operation with their Iraqi counterparts.
The exhibition, on show until February 3rd, is supported by iNCiA (International Network for Contemporary Iraqi Artists). It is as a reaction to recent events in Iraq’s troubled history.
”In response to the ongoing turmoil and confusion in our beloved homeland, Iraq, and at this crucial time in our history, we believe the role and responsibility of the artists is of utmost importance, not least of which is to motivate people positively and inspire them with that much needed hope for a more promising future”, explained Maysaloun Faraj Aya Gallery’s proprietor. A group of Iraqi artists, among them Adalet, Sadik Alfraji, Sadradeen Ameen, Dia Azzawi, Saadi Dawood, Leila Kubba and Ali Mandalawi have been brought together in a sensational outpouring of colour and emotions in sheer expression of hope.
"The creatures of my work are mythical poems illuminated by the charm of my country which comes from the distant past; part of it still found in nature, the other, already perished”, explained Sadradeen Ameen whose work Creatures No 2 mixed media on acrylic was one display. “ It is pure, personal discovery. I am inspired by ancient civilization and religious myths, fables and popular art. I look to the art of children and the designs of ancient cave-dwellers. I look for new horizons that have no ending. My world seems strange to many people, but it is real, and has the taste of modernity. When I paint, I feel that I live in an ancient world, or like a child who has just begun to learn to paint with total happiness”, not least of which is to motivate people positively and inspire them with that much needed hope for a more promising future”.
The work of Sadik Alfraji Old Dreams . mixed media on wood was accompanied by a poem:
"To fly
To soar so high
To break free
Was once a dream…
Now
The chains are broken
The tyrant has fallen
No more fear
No more hunger Yet still only a dream”
Leila Kubba completed her small painting, acrylic on wood, in September 2003.
“It started out as Gilgamish seeking eternal life, but the current political events took over my fascination with the past, and I found myself in the present and looking ahead to a new beginning, within my personal life and the larger transformation of Iraq”, Kubba explained. “The two figures in the reed boat represent the duality in us, the stronger and larger one is looking ahead and going forwards with courage, the smaller figure is glancing backwards with an oar in her hand slowing the process, hesitant about the uncertainty of a new future. Courage and determination are needed to move forward , but the tentativeness is also necessary to make us move with caution”.
After 21 years in exile, Iraqi artist Rashad Salim, who recently visited Baghdad commented that even Saddam over thirty years could not dominate the Iraqi spirit fully. One of his friends, Yaha Saeed, is travelling to the Iraqi capital in January with two Czech artists in the hope of encouraging paintings on the empty billboards once filled with Saddam’s posters. They would even like to decorate the concrete barriers erected by the Coalition Provisional Authority but the political correctness of this project is a hotly debated issue among Iraqi arts circles in London. “Do you want to make the occupation look beautiful?” asked Faisel Laibi Sahi.
Baghdad, like its inhabitants, remained a traumatised city, the artists affected by the painful experience of occupation. “Chaos and anarchy seemed to predominate in what were the most open and modern public spaces like highways and Bab el Sherki or Freedom Square. Every major civic, architectural complex or utility seemed bombed and/or looted. Every person and grain of Iraq is touched by trauma of the wars, sanctions, more war and now occupation. Concrete barriers are sown in the middle of streets separating the palaces of the new them from the same old us.
Back home artists are in dire straits after the war. Most successful artists are either abroad or have abandoned their art as they need to earn a living. The Iraqi Artists Society is still the main artists society but it is much deflated and still regrouping. The arts academies, institutes and general teaching colleges in every main governorate are slowly re-establishing themselves.
Salim helped set up a workshop in the artists society building and while he was in Baghdad, the Iraqi Artists Society held its first steering committee meeting. He also initiated a kite flying project involving scores of Iraqi children and artists. . It was November, the traditional season for flying kites which drifted effortlessly among the debris - an expression of hope, Iraqi art rising once again like a phoenix from the ashes.
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