Saloua Raouda Choucair

Saloua Raouda Choucair Tate Modern 2013

Hrรถnn Blรถndal Birgisdรณttir Visual Culture - IED Spring 2013

Saloua Raouda Choucair at Tate Modern, 17 April – 20 October 2013.

The first time in Tate’s 13 year history that the museum devotes a solo show to an artist who could be described as completely unknown in Britain. Choucair did not sell a single work in her home country until she was in her 50’s and in recent years she has become one of the most respected living artist there and increasingly acknowledged both in Lebanon and around the middle east.

160 pieces were shipped from the artists home in Beirut to London where over 100 pieces are then being exhibited. These pieces include sculptures, paintings, drawings, photographs and documents made or collected by the artist during five decades.

Some of Choucair’s paintings could pass as early Europian modernist work.

As Choucair’s daughter says that her work “has almost become classical, you know. You can’t tell what country or time it is from. It is global and unique at the same time”1

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http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/blogs/saloua-raouda-choucair-conversations-choucairs-daughter-hala

Saloua Raouda Choucair was born in Beirut, Lebanon in 1916. She was the first abstract painter in Lebanon and a great pioneer of the movement in the middle east, and her first exhibition, which was held in Beirut, was most likely the first abstract paint exhibition in the Arab world.

Choucair was taught to draw by Omar Onsi and Moustafa Farroukh, Lebanese artists who adopted impressionistic and realist styles.2 She graduated with a sophomore degree in Natural Sciences in 1936, before moving to Iraq where she taught the subject as well as drawing, at an elementary school. Later she would teach sculpture at a Lebanese university.

Choucair went to Paris in 1948, where she spent 3 years and visited the studios of Fernand Leger, Hadju, Martin and l'Atelier de l'Art abstrait of Jean Deswane and Edgar Pillet. There is visible influence of French culture in her work which can be linked to her stay in France where she probably studied the classic painting technique during those years and was heavily influenced by the artists mentioned above.

“I’m sure something happened in her mind in Paris, it put her on a track, but she felt she always had this track in her.

- Her soul was completely into forms and shapes” - Hala Shoukair, Choucair’s daughter. (Tate interview, 2013) Despite that, Choucair disagrees with her work having Europian influence, as she claimed in an interview: “It’s a universal influence”3 In 1962 sculpture became Choucair’s main interest, even though she kept exploring and creating other types of artwork. She said in an interview once that in the yearly 40‘s when she toured the streets and mosques of Cairo, she might have found the vision that she wanted. Being interested in exploring shapes and science she absorbed the architecture of those places that she visited.

Beautiful use of symmetry, lines, curves and colored surfaces are visible in Choucair’s work. She challenged not only use of colors and lines but also science, mathematics and architecture, which is visible in her sculptures. “ Some critics have said that her painting is reminiscent of a sculptor’s production and that her art would shatter the walls of an exhibition hall ” 4 Choucair is also very interested in Islamic art, which is reflected in her work, in an interview she once said that: “All the rules that (she) applies are derived from the Islamic religion and from islamic geometric design”5 Choucair received several awards during her career, including an award for her execution of a stone sculpture that she put up in a public site in Beirut and in 1965 she won first price for sculpture from the Ibraheem Sursouk museum. She was also the first Lebanese artist to receive the Reward of Excellence from the Ministry of Education and Culture and in 1977 she was awarded the Diploma Prize from the Architectural Association in London.

2

http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/articles/life-work-choucair

3 3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bB1K4H0vx0g

4

http://www.onefineart.com/en/artists/saloua_raouda_choucair/index.shtml

5

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bB1K4H0vx0g

As mentioned before, the exhibition includes different types of artwork, including vibrant gouache paintings, wooden sculptures, clay sculptures, sculptures made of plexiglass, nylon and aluminum.

“The line and curve are basic elements of the visual language that she used throughout her career, finding its way into a variety of media including painting, sculpture, textiles, murals and other domestic designs”6 The artwork I found most striking was an oil painting from 1947-51 (shown below). It is partly destroyed and contains pieces of broken glass, which are evidence from a bombing during the civil war in 1980, that happened near to her home. These reasons may seem not to be very relevant to her style or technique, but it is very interesting how she kept her art away from everything else. Even her work from the time of the war didn’t seem to be affected by the depression that was going on. Choucair’s daughter said in an interview for the exhibition at Tate that her mother did not live the conflict of Lebanon with an extreme depression, she was more focused on innovations in science and in the future than on all the bad things that were happening.

Two=One, 1947-51, Oil on canvas

6

http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/articles/life-work-choucair

Another piece of work I found intriguing was this gauche painting called Paris-Beirut. In the light of how much influence Choucair’s stay in Paris had on her, it is interesting to see how she portrays these two cities, that meant so much to her, together in one artwork.

Showing the main landmarks of the two cities, the eiffel tower and the Sannine mountain and rooftops of Beirut.

The use of colors and shapes is identical to many of her other paintings, smooth matt colors, straight lines and curves mixed together. In my opinion, even without the Islamic star, this is one of few of her pieces that could be identified as something from the Middle East.

Paris-Beirut, 1948

The piece shown below was made by stretching nylon threads diagonally between plexiglass sheets, creating a sculpture that is like an illusions since it seems to be constantly moving, from every angle. It clearly reflects her interest in experimenting with architecture and even if she is using nylon threads, she still manages to challenge the use of lines, creating a clear contrast between straight lines and curves.

Trajectory of the Arc, 1969-71

Experiment with Calligraphy 1947-50

Poem, 1963-65 (Part of series)

Many of Choucair’s sculptures are similar to the above one (right), made by stacking together shapes she carved from wood, metal or other materials. The way she makes them is sort of like calligraphy, the pieces can be stacked together in any way or stand on their own, just like letters.

She not only used this concept in her sculptures, but also in paintings, like this gauche painting she named simply “Experiment with calligraphy”.

Chores, 1948-49

These two paintings I find to have some similarities to Henri Matisse’s work. Self Portrait (left) with Matisse’s Madame Matisse, 1905 and Chores (right) with Matisse’s Dance.

Self Portrait, 1943

Sources: http://www.whoswhoarabwomen.com http://www.youtube.com/tate http://www.tate.org.uk http://www.onefineart.com

Artwork on front page: Composition in Blue, 1947-51, Oil paint on canvas