Art Archive

The state of war that derives all public debates is clearly evident in these two symposiums. The first symposium dealt with the difficulties of cultivating plastic art in the Sudanese environment, in general, its relation to the December Revolution, and some events that were hostile to the art of sculpture that impeded the job of erecting statues for the martyrs of the Revolution, according to Abdallah Mohamed Al-Tayib. Dr. Mohamed Abdulrahman Hassan presented his recent book series entitled: From the Criticism of Modernity to the Criticism of Civilization. There have been a debate that seemed to be far from the ongoing direct war on the ground, but it was essentially a talk of criticism of violence inflicted by the State machine on the pretext of modernity and civilization. The ravage printed on the walls of history is the violence in the name of science, religion, civilization and humanity. One of the wonders of repeating history in the Sudan and all the countries of the cultural margin in the twenty-first century is that a new cycle of violence has come to bring democracy by force of arms!

After the beginning of the activities of the Shorouq Gallery in Gadaref, most of the plastic activities have been gathered extensively and continuously in the city of Port Sudan, before crossing the borders out of the Sudan in Kampala, Nairobi and Addis Ababa. In the city of Port Sudan that is buzzing with the plastic activities, in general, some artistic initiatives have emerged to organize group shows for the works of some plastic artists, hosted by different institutions. The Sudanese Plastic Artists Union has established a new branch in Port Sudan and started networking with a number of artistic initiatives. The plastic artist, Issam Abdulhafeiz organized a symposium accompanied by a film presentation of his works on July 11, 2023. This symposium was followed by a workshop on the fundamentals of drawing and photography and exhibition organized by Sudanese Plastic Artists Union and hosted by the Khulal Gallery on July 27, 2023 under the title: "Dark Chapter." Exhibitions and plastic activities have rolled in the city, which may have received the largest number of plastic artists at the time. The plastic artists, Faisal Taj A-Sir, Al-Sadiq Mahmoud, Muataz Hadad, Mohamed Ahmed Ohaj, Mohamed Sidiq, and Mohamed Muatasim participated in the exhibition, organized by the Khulal Gallery. According to the brochure of this exhibition: "We are now on the darkest chapter in the history of the homeland; a chapter written by the war with all destruction, ravage and fires. As a war-affected group of artist, we decided not to give in to frustration that, in such circumstance, means defeat. While we recognize the gloominess of the chapter we live in, we are also sure that it is just a chapter that will be closed to record new brighter histories that include pages of freedom, hope and beauty. This is our contribution to close this chapter." After this large collective exhibition, the Muse Multi Gallery and the Khulal Gallery organized an extensive dialogue among plastic artists. This dialogue dealt with the themes of the approaches of the art with the reality of war. This dialogue dealt with the themes of the approaches of the art with the reality of war and how the artists will reflect on this situation. Interlocutors raised questions such as: How can the artists reflect on this situation? What are the main themes of the exhibition; especially it is a collective exhibition, not a solo?

Hall of the Khulal Gallery also embraced on September 9, 2023 a new exhibition by the artist Omar Khalil and the female artist Fadwa Saad, under the title: "Displacement of the Soul." The exhibition came about the ideas that appeared in its brochure: "We did not think that places would change as accelerated as that. After several stations, we settled like the rest of God creation in Port Sudan. Despite all beautiful details by which the Mermaid received us, another displacement other than that of the body continued with the journey. It was a reverse displacement that was opposed to the places, times and details which we had been familiar with as plastic artists, for decades, in the skies of Khartoum. There were two opposing displacements refusing to meet; body displacement and soul displacement. As plastic artists, we can only express with our tools of color, line and shape. The result of the exhibition was these paintings, most of which were produced in Port Sudan. These paintings came up with the details of bereavement and transformed them to aesthetic resistance. These paintings acknowledge that the solution is not in the gun, but in the art. Khulal Gallery organized a new exhibition for a wide range of 16 artists and female artists under the name: "Color", from 27 to 30 September 2023. Khulal Gallery also organized a solo exhibition by the plastic artist Al-Mughera Abdulbaqi under the name: "Survivors." The exhibition was accompanied by a discussion session, facilitated by the plastic artist Muzafar Ramadan. In an interview with Mowatinoon Electronic Newspaper, the artist Faisal Taj Al-Sir said that the message of the exhibition under the name: "Colors" is that: "The main message is continuity and triumph of the will of life. Brush is our fragile tool to achieve this. It is breakable at any moment, but before it breaks, it will open a new path in life. This is what we wanted to say. We practiced drawing before the war, but we felt it was time for art to connect directly and continuously with the public. Plastic art is a kind of resistance and triumph to the will of life." The plastic artist Al-Mughera Abdulbaqi said about the exhibition under the name: "Survivors": "Life is the greatest blessing gifted to human, but man ruined it with gluttony and injustice. After all those scenes I have seen there, and everything I see right now under war, I can tell that no one survived, even who thought he/she survived! We survivors live under the psychological stress of war. Many have gone mad, including those who have committed suicide and many who suffer from greed and exploitation. There is a lack of humanity; this is the trauma I live through. I am accompanied by questions that do not find answers: Is our survival a survival in the same sense? I wonder about peace and peaceful existence: What life will be like after the magnitude of this violence? I address with expressive drawing, through lines, colors and simple configurations, an aspect of survival from which no one will be spared. In a perfect symmetry between the various activities of the plastic art work that included numerous workshops, exhibitions and seminars, the Muse Multi Gallery continues its series of discussion sessions and approached several topics. On October 5, 2023, the first discussion session came under the title: "Trends of the Plastic Art in Port Sudan", which was an approach to the experiment of plastic artists, Mustafa Hussein and Abu Al-Hassan Madani. The discussion session was presented by the artist Faisal Taj Al-Sir and facilitated by Hassan Nassir. This discussion session was preceded by a symposium entitled: "The visual Art Scene in Port Sudan", presented by the artist Muzafar Ramadan.

After the war, the extension of plastic art was confined between the two Sudanese cities of Port Sudan and Al-Gadaref. But through this gate, the East Gate, dozens of Sudanese artists went out into Addis Ababa and Nairobi. These artists have continued to hold solo and collective exhibitions in collaboration with the local cultural organizations, wherever they went. They were gathering the Sudanese diaspora in their new displacement places in these countries. On August 16, 2023 in Addis Ababa, with a generous hosting from Fendika Cultural Center, the plastic artist and sculpture Dr. Abdulrahman Shagal organized a plastic art exhibition under the title: "Black Tears." He said this exhibition formed a new collection of works that he painted immediately upon his arrival in Addis Ababa, after the outbreak of the war. The paintings of this exhibition were indulgent in embodying the state of war and borrowing its symbols, as it seems from the title. There was a war paintings, a painting of the General and miscellaneous images and colors of the Khartoum fire. The atmosphere surrounding the exhibition was a purely Sudanese celebration that brought together the diaspora of artists, intellectuals and musicians for long days and nights. This atmosphere was concluded with a concert on which a selection of singers and musicians participated. These singers and musicians will be mentioned in the part related to signing and music. Upon their arrival from Ethiopia, the two artists Issam Abdulhafiez and Khalid Hamid organized biennial exhibition, in Nairobi that included a one-day presentation of their works as an initiative to support the Sudanese plastic artists. But the most remarkable event in Nairobi was the large exhibition that presented the works of eight Sudanese plastic artists in the hall of the French Cultural Center in Nairobi, on September 20, 2023. This exhibition came under the title: "Resilient Transition" and co-organized by Mohamed Hassan Moy, the founder of The 249 Art and Culture and Abdulrahim Shadad, the founder of The Downtown Gallery in Khartoum. In a video report released by Voanews Site, Shadad stated that the exhibition came to bring together the diaspora of the Sudanese artists in Kenya and to start producing new works after the works lost by most of the artists participating in the exhibition during the Khartoum. The exhibition was attended by: Khalid Hamid, Abubakr Muaz, Tibyan Bukhari, Yassir Al-Garai, Jalal Yousef, Al-Tayib Daw Al-Bait, Yassir Ali, Rashid Diyab, Hussein Halfawa, Miska Mohamed, Issam Abdulhazeiz and Mohamed Alamaldeen. As the war began to enter its sixth Month, the plastic artist Hassan Musa opened his exhibition on October 14, 2023, in the Maia Muller Gallery in the City of Lights, Paris. The exhibition was entitled: "People vs People: How Many Kardashians? The artist poses this question to criticize the phenomena of the dominance of the so-called "media and society stars", such as Johnny Depp and wife Amber Heard, George Clooney, Karadashian, etc. Hassan Musa writes: "How long the stage will be occupied by the pictures of those, while there is not a single newsroom for the news of people in the Sudan, Gaza, Ecuador, Yemen, Chile, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Venezuela and Sri Lanka! The artist makes fun of today's media, wondering: "How many Kardashians we need to bring peace to the world?"