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Lot Essay
In Sumerians, Mahmoud Sabri returns to the imagery of a Sumerian king on a chariot, depicted on a cylinder seal dating to around 3000 BCE. The ancient scene is recast through a vocabulary of geometric forms and saturated colour, its figures fragmented and interwoven across the picture surface. Deep blue, yellow and green establish strong chromatic contrasts, while the overlapping forms create a sense of movement and tension. Rather than reproducing the ancient source, Sabri subjects it to a process of abstraction in which the human figure remains central, but is increasingly defined through gesture, position and interaction. The work belongs to Sabri’s Turathiyat (Heritage) series of 1967–1968, a pivotal period in which his earlier socially engaged figuration developed towards a more abstract and symbolic language. His engagement with Mesopotamian antiquity was not simply an evocation of Iraq’s distant past, but a means of examining questions of power, conflict and human relations that remained pertinent to his own time. The ancient imagery provided Sabri with a historical framework through which contemporary experience could be reconsidered, bringing the social and political concerns of his earlier practice into a new formal language.
Sabri’s fascination with Sumerian cylinder seals centred on the relationships they represented. In an interview, he described them as representations of “life as imagined by the Sumerian artist”, drawing particular attention to encounters between human beings, between humans and animals, and between animals themselves. He was especially interested in the dynamics of domination and submission within these scenes: one human figure occupying a position of authority over another, or one animal overpowering and devouring its prey. For Sabri, these relationships revealed forms of hierarchy, conflict and suffering that, despite their ancient origins, remained recognisable in the modern world. The Sumerian image therefore offered not only a connection to Iraq’s distant past, but a way of considering the persistence of human conflict across time.
This continuity between ancient and modern conflict is particularly evident in Sabri’s recurring motif of the headless figure. The image draws upon the ancient visual language of Mesopotamia while also carrying a deeply personal and political association with the execution of Salam Adel, leader of the Iraqi Communist Party and a friend of the artist. The severed body thus operates on several temporal levels at once: as an ancient symbol, as a reference to a specific act of political violence, and as a more universal meditation on life, death and human suffering. For Sabri, the removal of the head does not simply signify death or the destruction of the individual; the body remains present, bearing the trace of violence even after the moment of death has passed. In this sense, the headless figure suggests that suffering does not necessarily end with death, but can persist through memory, history and the repetition of violence across generations.
Within Sabri’s broader oeuvre, Sumerians brings together the political concerns of his earlier figurative work with the formal experimentation that would define his later practice. The social realities that shaped his paintings of workers, peasants, prisoners and victims remain present, but are recast through fragmentation, geometric form and colour. His engagement with Sumerian imagery gives these concerns a wider temporal dimension, connecting contemporary experiences of conflict and suffering with an ancient visual history. At the same time, the painting anticipates Sabri’s move towards the more radical investigations of colour, perception, matter and energy that culminated in his formulation of Quantum Realism in 1971. Sumerians thus offers a rare convergence of Sabri’s political, historical and formal concerns, bringing the ancient heritage of Mesopotamia into direct dialogue with the realities of twentieth-century Iraq.
Born in Baghdad in 1927, Mahmoud Sabri was a painter, writer and intellectual whose practice developed alongside the political and cultural transformations of modern Iraq. He studied Social Sciences at Loughborough University before returning to Baghdad, where he joined the Société Primitive, later known as the Pioneers Group, working alongside artists like Faeq Hassan and Khalid Al Qassab. Deeply influenced by Marxist thought, he developed a socially engaged approach to art while also writing on realism and culture. His interest in the social function of art extended beyond his own practice, and he later directed Iraq’s Exhibitions Department, contributing to the development of its early international exhibition programme.
The political upheavals of the 1960s, particularly the persecution of Iraqi communists following the 1963 Ba’ath-led coup, had a profound impact on Sabri’s work. In 1960, he moved to Moscow to study mural painting at the Surikov Art Institute under Aleksandr Deyneka, before settling in Prague in 1963. His practice subsequently expanded into ancient Mesopotamian imagery, abstraction and the relationship between art and science. These investigations culminated in his formulation of Quantum Realism in 1971, through which he sought to reconsider the relationship between matter, energy, perception and artistic representation. Sabri remained in Prague for much of his later life before moving to England in 2009, where he spent his final years and died in Maidenhead in 2012.
Across the different stages of his career, Mahmoud Sabri’s work remained concerned with the relationship between political experience, historical memory, and changing understandings of reality. His works are held in major international collections, including Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha; Barjeel Art Foundation, Sharjah and the Ramzi and Saeda Dalloul Art Foundation (DAF), Beirut.
Sabri’s fascination with Sumerian cylinder seals centred on the relationships they represented. In an interview, he described them as representations of “life as imagined by the Sumerian artist”, drawing particular attention to encounters between human beings, between humans and animals, and between animals themselves. He was especially interested in the dynamics of domination and submission within these scenes: one human figure occupying a position of authority over another, or one animal overpowering and devouring its prey. For Sabri, these relationships revealed forms of hierarchy, conflict and suffering that, despite their ancient origins, remained recognisable in the modern world. The Sumerian image therefore offered not only a connection to Iraq’s distant past, but a way of considering the persistence of human conflict across time.
This continuity between ancient and modern conflict is particularly evident in Sabri’s recurring motif of the headless figure. The image draws upon the ancient visual language of Mesopotamia while also carrying a deeply personal and political association with the execution of Salam Adel, leader of the Iraqi Communist Party and a friend of the artist. The severed body thus operates on several temporal levels at once: as an ancient symbol, as a reference to a specific act of political violence, and as a more universal meditation on life, death and human suffering. For Sabri, the removal of the head does not simply signify death or the destruction of the individual; the body remains present, bearing the trace of violence even after the moment of death has passed. In this sense, the headless figure suggests that suffering does not necessarily end with death, but can persist through memory, history and the repetition of violence across generations.
Within Sabri’s broader oeuvre, Sumerians brings together the political concerns of his earlier figurative work with the formal experimentation that would define his later practice. The social realities that shaped his paintings of workers, peasants, prisoners and victims remain present, but are recast through fragmentation, geometric form and colour. His engagement with Sumerian imagery gives these concerns a wider temporal dimension, connecting contemporary experiences of conflict and suffering with an ancient visual history. At the same time, the painting anticipates Sabri’s move towards the more radical investigations of colour, perception, matter and energy that culminated in his formulation of Quantum Realism in 1971. Sumerians thus offers a rare convergence of Sabri’s political, historical and formal concerns, bringing the ancient heritage of Mesopotamia into direct dialogue with the realities of twentieth-century Iraq.
Born in Baghdad in 1927, Mahmoud Sabri was a painter, writer and intellectual whose practice developed alongside the political and cultural transformations of modern Iraq. He studied Social Sciences at Loughborough University before returning to Baghdad, where he joined the Société Primitive, later known as the Pioneers Group, working alongside artists like Faeq Hassan and Khalid Al Qassab. Deeply influenced by Marxist thought, he developed a socially engaged approach to art while also writing on realism and culture. His interest in the social function of art extended beyond his own practice, and he later directed Iraq’s Exhibitions Department, contributing to the development of its early international exhibition programme.
The political upheavals of the 1960s, particularly the persecution of Iraqi communists following the 1963 Ba’ath-led coup, had a profound impact on Sabri’s work. In 1960, he moved to Moscow to study mural painting at the Surikov Art Institute under Aleksandr Deyneka, before settling in Prague in 1963. His practice subsequently expanded into ancient Mesopotamian imagery, abstraction and the relationship between art and science. These investigations culminated in his formulation of Quantum Realism in 1971, through which he sought to reconsider the relationship between matter, energy, perception and artistic representation. Sabri remained in Prague for much of his later life before moving to England in 2009, where he spent his final years and died in Maidenhead in 2012.
Across the different stages of his career, Mahmoud Sabri’s work remained concerned with the relationship between political experience, historical memory, and changing understandings of reality. His works are held in major international collections, including Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha; Barjeel Art Foundation, Sharjah and the Ramzi and Saeda Dalloul Art Foundation (DAF), Beirut.