AMMAN — Large canvases by Syrian artist Omran Younis showing human beings’ fear of life and longing to return to a-safe-from-harm mother’s womb are on display in Amman’s Zara Gallery, bringing Syrian modernism to an enhanced and unconventional level.
Combining contemporary aesthetics with practices passed onto him by predecessors from the 1960s school of Syrian modernism, Younis has been exploring several styles over the years, endorsing an expressionist touch in his latest work, expressing emotional experience rather than reality.
“A mature modern Arab art was born in the 1960s,” art historian Zena Takieddine wrote in the essay “Arab Art in a Changing World”, “The artists’ sources of inspiration converged around issues of freedom, autonomy heritage and celebration of traditional beauty.”
Following journeys to Europe to pursue artistic training in the early 1950s, “Syrian artists were no longer imitators [of Western art] once back in their country, but mature visionaries forging creative art forms to carry meanings relevant to Arab identity.”
In the 1960s, heavyweight Syrian artists such Elias Zayyat and Fateh Moudarress, whose work has been sold at Christie’s, the world’s largest and most prestigious fine arts auction house, became professors at the Academy of Fine Arts in Damascus, paving the way for a new and innovative generation of artists.
Younis graduated from the academy at the end of the 1990s, in an environment imbued with pioneering inspirations.
The 42-year-old artist has been using the accomplishments of his predecessors as a stepping stone to forge his own artistic trademarks, “mixing bold social commentary with an acute sense of observation and a confident command of medium and technique”, critics wrote about his work.
In the exhibition “Human”, which runs through January 28, paintings in red and black hues show quintessential figures of mothers and infants which, despite being near enough to merge into a single body, look as being apart from each other as entities from distant universes.
“In ‘Human’, I face the fear of life that everyone feels often leading to memories and longing to return to their childhood or their mother’s womb,” the artist wrote as he was unable to leave Syria and attend his exhibition due to the ongoing civil conflict.
“Does this desire come from fear or is it perhaps an attempt to search for a new beginning?” the artist asked adding that he was often tantalised by the role played by madness in determining the road we choose to achieve our dreams.
