May 19, 2020 By Géranne Darbouze Taking into account their geographic locations and their religious and political histories, artists from the Arab world occupy a unique position. As a result, many have dedicated their lives to highlighting injustice — among them Iraqi artist Dia al-Azzawi. Known for his abstract paintings, sculptures, and tapestries, Azzawi is […]
April 23, 2020 By Karim Zidan As in the rest of New York City, the crowd at the Grey Art Gallery was dense and tightly packed, a mixture of ages, backgrounds, and ethnicities gathered together at the opening reception for the exhibition Taking Shape: Abstraction from the Arab World 1950s–1980s, which took place on January […]
April 15, 2020 By Géranne Darbouze I shall be supplied with whatever I need; and, if I have not everything I desire, I may conclude it is either not fit for me, or I shall have it in due time. —Matthew Henry As they say, life has a strange way of making things work out […]
March 19, 2020 By Lara Arafeh Recently I sat down for tea and nuts with Jerusalem-born Samia Halaby, a Palestinian-American artist whose works are on view in the Grey Art Gallery’s current exhibition, Taking Shape: Abstraction from the Arab World, 1950s–1980s. “If I wasn’t an artist, I would be a mathematician,” she said. Her mathematical […]
Included in the Grey Art Gallery's exhibition Taking Shape: Abstraction from the Arab World, 1950s-1980s is Saliba Douaihy (1915-1994), a leading 20th-century painter of Lebanon. Born in 1915 in a mountainous town in northern Lebanon, Douaihy was first exposed to painting and art through the Maronite churches in his hometown. Due to his apprenticeship with Habib Srour at the age of 14, his style was initially realistic and figurative. Srour was a portrait painter of religious, social, and political Arab figures in Lebanon and taught Douaihy the techniques of drawing and painting. Douaihy later assisted Srour in large church murals.