“Strongly” … artistic visions recounting the troubles of the Arab world

Barely a visitor to the golf club playgrounds in the Dreamland district of Sixth of October City (west Cairo), the walk begins between its flanks except with a sculptural piece or painting created by Egyptian and Arab artists, which expresses in many works the feelings of restlessness in certain Arab countries, and it forms The stadiums Since the launch of the gallery “Isle and Cam”, its first artistic event of this season, a collective exhibition can establish a new thought and not conventional in artistic presentation in Egypt, which allows to give the recipient a greater opportunity to communicate with the expressive and aesthetic energy of the works, and which is also consistent with the precautionary measures against the Corona virus.
The works of the “Loud Loud” exhibition, which will run until the end of next November, emerged from the closed rooms of the gallery towards the great outdoors and the wide horizon, presenting them in stadiums and green spaces, what the artist, Wiam Al-Masry, director of the gallery, returns to the tendency to convey New meanings and feelings, to bring the public back to art, especially after the reluctance of many to go to galleries, to fear of being in closed or crowded places.
Al-Masry does not deny her initial fear of exhibiting over a hundred works by 28 artists abroad, as she believed that artists might reject this unusual way of presenting or that it would limit the diversity of sizes and the nature of the exhibits, which represented artistic poverty, but luckily she was disappointed, and she said: Asharq Al-Awsat: “When we thought of organizing this exhibition, we were faced with many questions and concerns including the fact that we believed that large spaces necessarily required large works of art, as they would engulf small works and would not appear and be attractive to the recipient, while young people often produce Small works due to the high cost of materials, in addition to the fact that some great artists don’t tend to create huge works, and then we were almost confined to limited names, ta specificities and an artistic field, but we decided to allow everyone to enter this new artistic experience, and the result was unexpected.
The artists welcomed the idea and found it worthy of application in the current circumstances.The space of the horizon was rather a real addition to the works of art and gave a different impression of exhibiting it in inside the enclosed space of the gallery. As, despite the expansion of the exhibition space, despite its different sizes, types of materials and techniques, it imposed its expressive and aesthetic power a strong presence on the place, and added a lot to the picturesque landscape.
The exhibition includes a distinguished group of works by artists belonging to various artistic generations and different schools, among which the late artist Adam Hanin, artists Ahmed Abdel Wahab, Reda Abdel Salam, Abdel Aziz Saab, M. Abdo Salim, Muhammad Abla, Tamer Rajab and Sayed Waked, and Iraqi Ali Nuri, And Lebanese Bassam Kirollos and others.
Artist Tamer Rajab presents three sculptures of bronze, aluminum and polyester, and the works are a continuation of an idea he is working on in the current stage, which is nature and man’s struggle with it , and its reflection on the body, and how one person keeps looking for the other until they hear and communicate with them. The artist told Al-Sharq al-Awsat: “The title of the exhibition is consistent with its objectives, because every sculpture and painting it contains speaks with a (loud voice) in public after being formed and formulated with expressive artistic phrases and clear lines, in a very difficult period of time and an atmosphere, which is a period of resistance (Corona) ”. Ragab gets his hands on other features that distinguish the exhibition, saying: “While the exhibition in Egypt is still based on closed rooms and places equipped with constant lighting in a narrow space, this time the works are presented on a large scale embraced by nature which paints shadow and light on the works of art, thus gaining other influences, especially the sculptures which were mainly formed from natural materials such as stone, granite, marble, copper and bronze, as if it started with nature and returned to it.
While artist Sayed Waked told “Al-Sharq al-Awsat”: “I still find myself passionate about the expression of human gatherings in general, after stripping them of features and details. Because it is these details that draw identity differences and generate differences, disagreements and intolerance, and perhaps the presentation in this Egyptian-Arab gathering of artists with different artistic experiences and ages in one place serves my idea which was launched loudly by their ideals, perhaps clearly reaching the stakes.
Through a painting and six statues, the Lebanese artist Bassam Kirollos expresses wars and devastation, what his society is going through, and he overcomes works influenced by his academic style as a university professor, and he says: “He is difficult for an artist who lives in the midst of all the scourges of wars for his concern of not being his homeland, so I feel concerned Lebanon Issues, and I consider trying to convey his voice my fundamental message to the world.
The question of the “exceptional circumstances of the homeland” is also what preoccupies the Iraqi artist Ali Al-Nouri in his sculptural works in the exhibition. Through 12 granite statues that embody the turbulent conditions of his home country, the recipient’s sentiment of this increases his blend between classicism and strong expressive strokes that earn him the traits of brutality in art, which also reflects the cases of change that a person undergoes during the various stages of his life.
Al-Nouri told Asharq Al-Awsat: “I found in the unconventional presentation an affirmation of the meanings that my works carry in terms of turmoil, dispersion and lack of stability in contemporary societies, because exposing my Large-scale outdoor sculptures help to achieve this, as there is a large space that allows for the contemplation of the works and for dialogue. With her from all angles ”.