Now for a little culture.

[Sally]

Now for a little culture.

Mohannad Orabi talks about Ayyam Gallery’s latest exhibition featuring Syrian artists, moving from UAE to London

Ben East

August 6, 2014

When the Dubai-based *cousins Hisham and Khaled Samawi opened their first Ayyam Gallery in Damascus in 2006, they were merely dipping their toes into the nascent contemporary art scene in the city. They couldn’t possibly have foreseen how important *Ayyam – and Dubai – would become to Syrian artists.

Early last year, Hisham told The National how the crisis in Syria had forced Ayyam to move not just its collection, but the artists themselves, to Dubai, Cairo and Beirut. The Damascus gallery became a studio compound – a safety zone of sorts – for artists in a war zone. It was a dreadful situation, but there has been a quite incredible silver lining.

Because the Syrian artists they could help were now able to work in peace, had available gallery space in which to exhibit and, most importantly of all, a story to tell through their art, the Samawis’ popularity rose dramatically. One of their artists, Tammam Azzam, relocated to Dubai and saw his pieceFreedom Graffiti – in which he superimposed Klimt’s The Kiss onto a bombed-out *Damascus building – go viral around the world last year.

Read more:
Mohannad Orabi talks about Ayyam Gallery's latest exhibition featuring Syrian artists moving from UAE to London | The National

 

[Book of Jeremiah]

What a brilliantly talented artist he is! I wonder about artists and poets. It seems the best ones usually have suffered the most. I do not know if I'm reading something into it that isn't there but it sure seems that way to me. Writers too. If they suffer alot they write better for it. More passion. imo.

 

[Sally]

What a brilliantly talented artist he is! I wonder about artists and poets. It seems the best ones usually have suffered the most. I do not know if I'm reading something into it that isn't there but it sure seems that way to me. Writers too. If they suffer alot they write better for it. More passion. imo.

You could be right about that in some cases, but I think it has more to do with talent amd creative ability. However, I did read not too long ago that bipolars were very creative people. Anyhow, I always wished that I was talented so that I was able to paint like many of these artists do, although some times when you see the work of someone like Mondrian, you wonder if that is really talent. I guess to some people it is.

 

[Book of Jeremiah]

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder so they say, Sally. I reckon art is that way. There is some art I have seen and thought, you call that art? That is ridiculous! But..... I would not say it out loud because they might get offended. Although some of them might need offending though so they do something else with their life and quit wasting their time! The Syrian man in the story definitely has talent. I'm glad he is out of there and in a safe place where he and his family can live in peace and have a normal life. Good for him.