Reading-list-modern-arab-art-part-two

Reading List: Modern Arab Art (Part Two)

Date: 05 Oct 2023 By

In our second Reading List for Modern Arab Art we delve deeper into the history of the discipline and suggest a number of important works that could be of interest for you. Do not forget to check out the first part of this series outlining some of the most significant books and volumes dealing with the topic.

Von Maltzahn, N., & Bellan, M. (Eds.) (2018). The Art Salon in the Arab Region: The Politics of Taste Making. Lebanon: Orient-Institut Beirut.

Nadia von Maltzahn and Monique Bellan’s volume discusses the emergence and role of the art salon in the Arab region in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, focusing on Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Lebanon and Iraq. This book is a must for anyone wanting to understand how the salon impacted the formation of taste and artistic debates, as the authors discuss the transfers and cultural interactions between the region and Europe. Following the institutional model of the Paris salons, art salons emerged in Algiers, Tunis and Cairo starting in the late 1880s.

Dagher, C. (2016). Arabic Hurufiyya: Art and Identity. Milan: Skira.

Charbel Dagher’s book recollects the history of the region’s only ‘pan-Arab’ modern art movement, the Hurufiyya. Dagher’s original Arabic volume was published in 1991 and the 2016 published English translation helps non-Arabic speaking audience to comprehend the history of this art movement more thoroughly.

Gasparian, N. (2020). Commitment in the Artistic Practice of Aref El-Rayess: The Changing of Horses. London: Anthem Press.

Natasha Gasparian reconstructs an alternative reading of Aref El-Rayess’s The 5th of June (also known as The Changing of Horses) artwork. In her analysis, Gasparian argues that the picture was presented and received, allegorically or metaphysically, as an idealised narrative of national liberation. By tracing the caesuras and slips in discourse, she reconstructs an alternative reading of the artwork’s uncanny yet historically determinate character.

Breish, A.G., & Macmillan, L. (2020). The Breish Collection of Modern and Contemporary Arab Art. Milan: Skira.

The Breish Collection of Modern and Contemporary Arab Art presents a catalogue charting the art investment strategy of prominent Libyan banker Abdul Magid Breish. In this personal book, Breish describes his journey as an art collector and his views on the role of collectors: he argues that collectors bear a responsibility to support regional and local art scenes.

Sheehi, S. (2016). The Arab Imago: A Social History of Portrait Photography, 1860-1910. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Although not dealing with modern Arab art but cultural production on a larger scale, Stephen Sheehi’s groundbreaking account of early photography in the Arab world is a must for all the regional art enthusiasts. The Arab Imago concentrates primarily on studio portraits by Arab and Armenian photographers in the late Ottoman Empire. Examining previously known studios such as Abdullah Frères, Pascal Sébah, Garabed Krikorian and Khalil Raad, the book also provides the first account of other pioneers such as Georges and Louis Saboungi, the Kova Brothers, Muhammad Sadiq Bey and Ibrahim Rif’at Pasha—as well as the first detailed look at early photographs of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. In addition, the book explores indigenous photography manuals and albums, newspapers, scientific journals and fiction.

Lenssen, A. (2020). Beautiful Agitation: Modern Painting and Politics in Syria. Oakland: University of California Press.

Examining the works of artists Kahlil Gibran, Adham Ismail and Fateh al-Moudarres, Beautiful Agitation explores how painters in Syria activated the mutability of form to rethink relationships of figure to ground, outward appearance to inner presence, and self to world. Drawing on archival materials in Syria and beyond, Anneka Lenssen reveals new trajectories of painterly practice in a twentieth century defined by shifting media technologies, moving populations, and the imposition of violently enforced nation-state borders. The result is a study of Arab modernism that foregrounds rather than occludes efforts to agitate against imposed identities and intersubjective relations – an immensely important book for the history of modern Arab art.

Seggermann, A.D. (2019). Modernism on the Nile: Art in Egypt between the Islamic and the Contemporary. Chapel Hill: The University of North Caroline Press.

Analysing the modernist art movement that arose in Cairo and Alexandria from the late nineteenth century through the 1960s, Alex Dika Seggerman reveals how the visual arts were part of a multifaceted transnational modernism. While the work of diverse, major Egyptian artists during this era may have appeared to be secular, she argues, it reflected the subtle but essential inflection of Islam, as a faith, history and lived experience, in the overarching development of Middle Eastern modernity.

Challenging typical views of modernism in art history as solely Euro-American, and expanding the conventional periodisation of Islamic art history, Seggerman theorises a “constellational modernism” for the emerging field of global modernism. Rather than seeing modernism in a generalised, hyperconnected network, she finds that art and artists circulated in distinct constellations that encompassed finite local and transnational relations. Such constellations, which could engage visual systems both along and beyond the Nile, from Los Angeles to Delhi, were materialised in visual culture that ranged from oil paintings and sculpture to photography and prints.

Shabout, N. M., Al-Khudhairi, W., & Chalabi, D. (2010). Sajjil: A Century of Modern Art. Skira.

This exhibition catalogue presents Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art collection’s highlights to expose new audiences to modern art from the Arab world and reveals the story of the formation and development of modern art in the Arab world. This book accompanied the first long-term installation in the museum’s galleries, and presents works in thematic, chronological and regional context.

Kholeif, O., & Stobbs, C. (2015). Imperfect Chronology Arab Art from the Modern to the Contemporary: Works from The Barjeel Art Foundation. Prestel.

Celebrating the Barjeel Art Foundation’s expansive collection, this book maps a genealogy of modern and contemporary Arab art and offers one of the most extensive presentations of modern Arab art.

Shabout, N. M. (2010). Interventions: A Dialogue between the Modern and the Contemporary. Skira.

This exhibition catalogue celebrates the work of six living artists from the Arab world who were among the first to introduce and advocate for a self-identified “modern” art movement, who interacted with wider Arab art movements, and who continue to be relevant today. The catalogue demonstrates their artistic development from their early years to their more recent output.

Takesh, S., & Gumpert, L. (2020). Taking Shape: Abstraction from the Arab World, 1950S-1980s. Grey Art Gallery, New York University.

Taking Shape traces the emergence and development of abstraction in the Arab world through paintings and sculpture dating from the 1950s through the 1980s. Drawn from the collection of the Barjeel Art Foundation in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, this book features nearly ninety works by a diverse group of artists whose creative visions stretched beyond the boundaries of representation.

Mikdadi, S. (1994). Forces of Change: Artists of the Arab World. International Council for Women in the Arts.

This exhibition catalogue groups the work of 70 women artists from 15 countries in the Arab world, including Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Sudan, Tunisia, and the United Arab Emirates.

Wishing you happy readings!

Featured image: Hamed Ewais, ‘Dr Mostafa Sweif’ (1961).