Arab Art -- An Introduction
By Ali Jaafar
In the summer of 2004, The Barbican Arts Centre in London hosted a one-day Arab Arts workshop, looking at a broad range of contemporary and modern art from the region. The workshop was organised and presented by Zenith Foundation, a UK based organisation established to promote contemporary Arab Arts, with financial support from Arts Council England and Visiting Arts.
The workshop featured speakers from around the region and the art world, including Saleh Barakat, a specialist in pan-Arab art which he sells from his Beirut gallery Agial, Iraqi artist and curator Rashad Salim, a specialist on Iraqi art and regular contributor to Blink. Other panellists included Lebanese-Canadian artist and curator Jayce Salloum, whose work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris and Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris; Catherine David, the Director of Witte de With, a centre for contemporary art based in Rotterdam, as well as Els Van Der Plas, Director of the Prince Claus Foundation in the Netherlands.
The audience was treated to a journey through Arab art, beginning with a conceptualising talk by Barakat, who asserted that modern and contemporary art from the Middle East should be categorised into main three epochs: from 1870-mid 20th century, the second half of the 20th century, and finally art from the 1990's to the present day.
Having established such a premise, the discussions began looking in earnest at the state of current artistic practices, and as importantly, the financial and political realities of maintaining a credible art market in the region. In front of a largely professional audience, with representatives from the British Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum, The Hayward Gallery as well as curators such as Rose Issa, the talks veered from the impact of the military action in Iraq to the diversely vibrant young artists to be found in Lebanon, Egypt and Palestine, as well as the ongoing impact that the “freedom deficit” in the Middle East had on allowing creativity to flourish.
In a particularly elliptical presentation, Salim mused on the notion that “we need a way to create a new art with new emphasis. The modern is dead. I think the indigenous is the only way for us to move forward.” Stating that Iraqi art was going through a state of shock, he spoke about the current situation in his native Iraq. “Everything is interim at the moment in Iraq. I'm a bit worried at the moment because there's a continuity of some of the worst aspects of previous times. For example the Saddam portrait artists are still very active but now they're doing portraits of American officers and soldiers.”
A constant theme throughout the day was the difficulty in “representing the unrepresentable,” and the thesis that the term Arab art itself was meaningless and needed to be replaced by the term “Art from the Arab world.” Salloum began his presentation with the words, “How do you represent that which has been drained of meaning. There is no Arab art. We have too many names for the region and too few names for the people.” Given this basic premise, it was fascinating to witness the exchanges between some of the Western and Arab practitioners in attendance, particularly given the high powered level of many of the UK delegates, which underlined the increased interest in contemporary Arab art and representations of the region. A key issue raised throughout the day was the need for Arab arts organizations to develop strategies for sustainability, as well as the importance of building infrastructures that would enable Arab artists to prosper.
Which brings us to the role Zenith Foundation is now playing. Founded by Mona Tayara-Deeley, the organisation is dedicating itself to promoting Arab arts in the UK and beyond. In addition to the event at the Barbican, Zenith organised a month long festival of Arab films at London’s National Film Theatre in August 2004, which showcased the best films from the last 10 years from across the region, including Algeria, Lebanon, Palestine, Egypt and Syria. All the delegates were positive in their comments about the importance of such an organization, particularly given the professionalism and high quality debates of the day. Barakat commented, “The first thing about Zenith was that they did a serious thing. It was very well planned. There were representatives from most of the cultural establishments in Britain today and all of them were very interested. It was a mind opener. Events like this will build up to create a serious awareness that will lead one day to a better exchange. “ His views were mirrored by Salloum, who added, “The event serves as a good introduction to the issues that need to be fleshed out with people re-looking at how they're approaching their projects and developing them for either export or internal use within the Arab world and Middle East. The momentum of people meeting at the conference and the ideas generated might serve to take it the next step.”
Tayara-Deeley expounded on her decision to set up Zenith. “The idea for Zenith started in December 2001 as the penny dropped that, without giving greater visibility to high quality contemporary Arab arts, Arabs stood little chance of being understood in the West. More importantly, we realised that supporting Arab contemporary cultural production was first and foremost an Arab internal priority.”
As she plans to publish a book based on the Arab Art event, as well as continuing work on the upcoming NFT season she was optimistic about the future. “Zenith will carry on working across the spectrum of Arab arts. There is a lot out there to keep us going for a long time.”
