Reading continues to be my favourite form of mind travel and different narrative traditions have formed the basis of all my artistic work. Ever since I could first read, the Middle East of ‘The 1001 Nights’ has fascinated me. I fell for the wondrous stories with their fabulous imagery. ‘The 1001 Nights’ remains a unique collection of magical stories from a by-gone, mysterious world with an intelligent and beautiful woman at its center. This woman shows us how narrative persuasion can alter the impossible.
For the past few years, I have been working with cheap recycled materials and especially papier mâché for its properties such as solidity, durability and lightness. My work uses plain newsprint, showing sometimes the original fonts, and more often newsprint that I coloured. The original paper, however, is always evident, be it in the texture or in the print and different fonts shining through.
In the Magic Carpets, exposed here, I started each work with colouring the newsprint and then cutting or tearing it into narrow strips of the appropriate length. Using these coloured strips of newsprint, I created shapes on an undulating surface which I had previously built up with layers of papier mâché. To achieve depth, intensity and range of colour, most carpets use of several layers of these fine strips. The entire process reflects my own attempt at subtle persuasion!
The balanced geometric and organic shapes of the letters of the Arabic or any alphabet fascinate me. In the Magic Carpets, I am also looking for this balance. Traditional Arabic art solved the ban on the organic by supplementing it with the ornamental. I also used ornaments but limited its use to a few iconographic forms such as the paisley and rounded lozenges. Some of the Magic Carpets are stripped of any ornaments. They look as seen from far away seen while in flight; they represent the undulating dynamics of their surface area.
Since the Magic Carpets are modelled, three-dimensional objects, they should ideally be placed leaning against a wall, resting on the floor or suspended from the ceiling. All objects have been worked on both sides.
In the course of my intense engagement with this subject, I have so far created over 40 ‘Magic Carpets’.
