This year, we showcased works by prominent artists Adel El Siwi, Soad Abdel Rasoul, and Ali Abdel Mohsen.
Adel El Siwi
Widely known for his monumental faces, Adel El Siwi delights us here with a body of work which is the fruit of six years dedicated to an intense reflection on the nature of the animal and its ambivalent relationship with the human being. Adel El Siwi’s impressive and deeply personal painting technique combined with his ability to continuously update his narrative skills, as well as his unshakable faith in the possibility of giving birth to new worlds by means of painting, give birth to a body of work which is at the same time strongly sensual and conceptually lucid. El Siwi’s colourful large canvases are equipped with a dazzling interior light, as if proclaiming a revelation, each telling a full story of its own. In his long series of studies of the different typologies of animals he attempt to seize the “personality” that lies behind each creature’s appearance. El Siwi sets up a fine network of cultured citations drawn from literature, cinema and art history, whereby he appropriates other artists’ animals, reviving and reinventing them, to achieve a universe where every creature, whether animal or human, participates fully-fledged, not subject to hierarchical classification, but as a protagonist.
Widely known for his monumental faces, Adel El Siwi delights us here with a body of work which is the fruit of six years dedicated to an intense reflection on the nature of the animal and its ambivalent relationship with the human being. Adel El Siwi’s impressive and deeply personal painting technique combined with his ability to continuously update his narrative skills, as well as his unshakable faith in the possibility of giving birth to new worlds by means of painting, give birth to a body of work which is at the same time strongly sensual and conceptually lucid. El Siwi’s colourful large canvases are equipped with a dazzling interior light, as if proclaiming a revelation, each telling a full story of its own. In his long series of studies of the different typologies of animals he attempt to seize the “personality” that lies behind each creature’s appearance. El Siwi sets up a fine network of cultured citations drawn from literature, cinema and art history, whereby he appropriates other artists’ animals, reviving and reinventing them, to achieve a universe where every creature, whether animal or human, participates fully-fledged, not subject to hierarchical classification, but as a protagonist.
Soad Abdel Rasoul
Soad Abdel Rasoul employs different mediums such as drawing, painting, graphic design, and collage to delineate densely detailed and interweaving human and geographical maps that help us to trace back our roots in the magnitude of the living world. By depicting metamorphosed figures, she doesn’t seek to visualise human physical beauty, but attempts to reflect on the earth’s secrets and the connections between humans and the elements of existence like earth, metals and plants. Tree-like figures, branching veins and arteries, and monstrous insect-like characters merge on the canvas to remind viewers of the vital bond between the interior of the human body and the exterior. By using fragments of maps and scientific illustrations of the human body, Soad Abdel Rasoul re-conceptualises the way we perceive space and repurposes notions of body, science, and nature into something strikingly personal, which exalts the feminine, the emotional, the overgrowing natural, and the animalesque.
Soad Abdel Rasoul employs different mediums such as drawing, painting, graphic design, and collage to delineate densely detailed and interweaving human and geographical maps that help us to trace back our roots in the magnitude of the living world. By depicting metamorphosed figures, she doesn’t seek to visualise human physical beauty, but attempts to reflect on the earth’s secrets and the connections between humans and the elements of existence like earth, metals and plants. Tree-like figures, branching veins and arteries, and monstrous insect-like characters merge on the canvas to remind viewers of the vital bond between the interior of the human body and the exterior. By using fragments of maps and scientific illustrations of the human body, Soad Abdel Rasoul re-conceptualises the way we perceive space and repurposes notions of body, science, and nature into something strikingly personal, which exalts the feminine, the emotional, the overgrowing natural, and the animalesque.
Ali Abdel Mohsen
Through spontaneous and individualised apocalyptic imagery, Ali Abdel Mohsen creates an art which is incumbent upon all people. A self-taught artist and journalist, he uses line drawings and acrylic colours mixed with dirt and cigarette ashes on the surfaces of disused cardboard boxes to convey his impressions of decline in contemporary society. Strongly influenced by his surroundings, his work depicts a dystopian world of nihilism and paranoia. Placed in post-apocalyptic scenarios of undefined urban spaces, the scenes portray a society where violence, chaos and corruption have taken over. The individual plays no role: his subjects are faceless victims of the system. In the attempt to explore the grey areas of human nature in a society that is falling apart, the power of visual imagery is brought into play to the greatest extent by utilising consumed materials, which reflect the sense of exhaustion and abandonment of the people. Nonetheless, Abdel Mohsen gives not only an account of contemporary degradation, but portrays a slow war, where alienated figures suggest some latent signs of resilience.
Ali Abdel Mohsen’s artwork, unique in its suggestive titles, such as ‘Slow war’, ‘This a dream come true’, and ‘Razor-sharp teeth’, have been featured in solo and group exhibitions in Egypt, Lebanon, Germany, Denmark, and Dubai. His publications have appeared in important newspapers including Egypt Independent, Mada Masr, Harper's and Al Arabiya. This talented and unprecedented artist was represented by Cairo’s Mashrabia Gallery of Contemporary at the Art the Beirut Art Fair, 2016 and in the last years has been rising rapidly in the regional scene.
Through spontaneous and individualised apocalyptic imagery, Ali Abdel Mohsen creates an art which is incumbent upon all people. A self-taught artist and journalist, he uses line drawings and acrylic colours mixed with dirt and cigarette ashes on the surfaces of disused cardboard boxes to convey his impressions of decline in contemporary society. Strongly influenced by his surroundings, his work depicts a dystopian world of nihilism and paranoia. Placed in post-apocalyptic scenarios of undefined urban spaces, the scenes portray a society where violence, chaos and corruption have taken over. The individual plays no role: his subjects are faceless victims of the system. In the attempt to explore the grey areas of human nature in a society that is falling apart, the power of visual imagery is brought into play to the greatest extent by utilising consumed materials, which reflect the sense of exhaustion and abandonment of the people. Nonetheless, Abdel Mohsen gives not only an account of contemporary degradation, but portrays a slow war, where alienated figures suggest some latent signs of resilience.
Ali Abdel Mohsen’s artwork, unique in its suggestive titles, such as ‘Slow war’, ‘This a dream come true’, and ‘Razor-sharp teeth’, have been featured in solo and group exhibitions in Egypt, Lebanon, Germany, Denmark, and Dubai. His publications have appeared in important newspapers including Egypt Independent, Mada Masr, Harper's and Al Arabiya. This talented and unprecedented artist was represented by Cairo’s Mashrabia Gallery of Contemporary at the Art the Beirut Art Fair, 2016 and in the last years has been rising rapidly in the regional scene.