28 Dec. 2000 - 3 Jan. 2001
Issue No.514
|
Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 28 Dec. 2000 - 3 Jan. 2001 Issue No.514 |
||
| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Current issue | Previous issue | Site map | ||
In shining armour
Mounir Kanaan and Sabry Ragheb: two creatures of magic lost in the course of the winding year, champions of line, colour and beyond. Kanaan of the dynamic brush stroke, Ragheb of the poetic eye: the phenomenal world bows solemnly in memory of their plastic prowess, mourning without tears.
The first is violent, a knight riding his steed. The hurdles that stand in his way comprise tall structures: squares, cubes, triangles and complex combinations of line whose ecstatic discovery -- forever new, shared secretly by painter and viewer -- is Kanaan's exclusive prerogative. Master Motion, he knew how to utilise the subtler cadences of sight, extending them beyond space, beyond time, into the ineffable realm of the artistic. His character and his paintings were alike: both operated in the shadow of motion. Motion came first, then (a visually riveting) structure. In conversation as in painting, Kanaan sculpted sentence after sentence, connecting paragraphs in unexpectedly regenerative ways. He did not stand by formalities, he might even grab you by the lapels, drawing you straight into what he had to say, and uncovering an intensely magic world of shapes and colours in the process -- a world whose peculiar life forms survived for more than a quarter, and slightly less than half, a century. We would meet once in a while, exchange thoughts about paintings and occasionally also jokes. To my generation, he was like an old and generous tree: he offered shade, fruit and infinite wisdom. First, he advised me to go to Paris, then, when I was there, I invited him over. I would invite him and wait with longing. But he never showed up.
The second, delicate of temperament, knew how to squeeze poetry out of the faces of his subjects -- his friends. A romance-ridden troubadour, on his winged journeys he rode a unicorn, straddling reality and imagination in an unprecedented display of prettiness: he immersed his brush in the colours of the garden, the flower, the leaf.
Once tickled by it, the face of a woman, even that of a man, gave birth to heavenly wonders. Ragheb was the Maestro -- like Mohamed Abdel-Wahab -- whose tunes resembled the steady flow of a stream. He granted me an incredible wish, he before whom all and sundry had submitted their aspect. Sitting still in my Paris studio, he let me paint him. There was a moment of crisis as I finished: how would he see the work of younger colleague? Yet I passed the exam -- a great feat, considering how he was capable of diving into a face so that the veins turned into tree branches, penetrating through the skin into the soul and ultimately telling the truth. In the presence of Gamal Kamel, in Paris, he yelled at me, "Will you pay attention to nudes, please." The next day my French girl friend was there, her nude body flowing beautifully on the couch. And as he took hold of his brush, looking at her with what seemed like detachment, I knew I would be so engrossed in his work I wouldn't dare hold my own brush that day.
© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved
 |
|
|||||||||||||||||
