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Lot Essay
The pioneer Syrian artist Mahmoud Hammad was born in Damascus in 1923. A painter, printmaker, medal engraver and sculptor, he attended the Italian School of Damascus and was encouraged from an early age to develop his artistic skills. Travelling to Italy at age sixteen, he discovered the works of the Renaissance Masters which continued to inspire him, but the war forced him to return to Syria where he actively took part in the artistic scene.
In 1953, Hammad returned to Italy as he was granted a scholarship from the Syrian Government to study at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome. There he developed his artistic production and worked closely with other Middle Eastern artists including Adham Ismail and Fateh Moudarres. He painted many landscapes, nudes and faces in an academic style, not yet confident enough as an artist to establish his own signature style. Upon his return to Syria in 1957 and after his marriage to the Lebanese artist Durriya Fakhoury, Hammad became an art professor in Daraa where he lived for two years, a period during which he painted scenes of the Southern area of Horan and strived for his own artistic identity. His passion for the archeological and social aspects of the city of Daraa led him to paint many landscapes and politically infused works.
Back in Damascus, alongside Nassir Chaura and Elias Zayat, Hammad founded the Damascus Group, a gathering of Syrian abstract artists and subsequently achieved an aesthetic maturity. From 1964 until his passing in 1988, Hammad developed his celebrated abstract style and Arab script and letters became the central elements of his aesthetic exploration. By arranging the letters throughout the surface of the work in a modern and innovative style, Hammad instilled rhythm into his paintings. In the first years, these words were decipherable, but with time, they melted into abstraction and became architectural and musical compositions where emotions took over the essential meaning of words.
The present work entitled Dhad, T.S.M, from his sought after Abstract Calligraphy period, stands at the edge between his series of distinguishable and readable composition of letters and his turn towards pure formal abstraction. Dhad, in the right of side of the composition, is a letter that only exists in the Arabic language and the three letters, phonetically spelled T.S.M to the left of the composition, are to be found in several verses of the Holy Koran, although despite many studies, their significance remains a mystery. On the surface of the canvas, the letters intertwine and essentially become form, allowing the viewer to sense the religious quality of the composition as much as its visual beauty and exuberance.
In 1953, Hammad returned to Italy as he was granted a scholarship from the Syrian Government to study at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome. There he developed his artistic production and worked closely with other Middle Eastern artists including Adham Ismail and Fateh Moudarres. He painted many landscapes, nudes and faces in an academic style, not yet confident enough as an artist to establish his own signature style. Upon his return to Syria in 1957 and after his marriage to the Lebanese artist Durriya Fakhoury, Hammad became an art professor in Daraa where he lived for two years, a period during which he painted scenes of the Southern area of Horan and strived for his own artistic identity. His passion for the archeological and social aspects of the city of Daraa led him to paint many landscapes and politically infused works.
Back in Damascus, alongside Nassir Chaura and Elias Zayat, Hammad founded the Damascus Group, a gathering of Syrian abstract artists and subsequently achieved an aesthetic maturity. From 1964 until his passing in 1988, Hammad developed his celebrated abstract style and Arab script and letters became the central elements of his aesthetic exploration. By arranging the letters throughout the surface of the work in a modern and innovative style, Hammad instilled rhythm into his paintings. In the first years, these words were decipherable, but with time, they melted into abstraction and became architectural and musical compositions where emotions took over the essential meaning of words.
The present work entitled Dhad, T.S.M, from his sought after Abstract Calligraphy period, stands at the edge between his series of distinguishable and readable composition of letters and his turn towards pure formal abstraction. Dhad, in the right of side of the composition, is a letter that only exists in the Arabic language and the three letters, phonetically spelled T.S.M to the left of the composition, are to be found in several verses of the Holy Koran, although despite many studies, their significance remains a mystery. On the surface of the canvas, the letters intertwine and essentially become form, allowing the viewer to sense the religious quality of the composition as much as its visual beauty and exuberance.