Exhibited
EXHIBITED: Beirut, Dar Al Karama, 1981. Beirut, Beirut Arab University, 1982. Damascus, Union of Arab Artists, 1983. Kuwait City, National Cultural Centre, 1984. Kuala Lumpur, The National Museum, 1987; this exhibition later travelled around Malaysia for a period of 8 months. Abu Dhabi, The Cultural Centre, 1989. Amman, Jordan National Museum, circa 1990s. Ramallah, Ramallah Museum, 1996. ISMAIL SHAMMOUT ODYSSEY OF A PEOPLE ‘The painting was not just a means to beautifying one’s life, albeit essential in such a harsh and agonizing environment, but it was an expression of hope, an embodiment of the Palestinian wound, a mirror refecting the Palestinians yearning for salvation and return.’ (The artist quoted in I. Shammout, Art in Palestine, Kuwait 1989, p. 11). Ismail Shammout has long been recognised as one of Palestine’s leading modernist painters, whose prominent style employs familiar symbols of Palestinian traditions and culture that have contributed to constructing a visual narrative of Palestinian nationalism continuing to infuence today’s generation of Palestinian, as well as Middle Eastern, artists. Shaped by his own tragic history which includes tales of a forced exodus of both himself and his family from Lydda in 1948 by the Isr 3/4 li and Jewish forces and relocation to the Gaza refugee camp of Khan Younis, Shammout eventually moved to neighbouring Egypt and then Rome to study art. Upon his return to Gaza three years later, he established himself as a distinguished painter and activist. Eventually settling in Beirut with his wife, the artist Tamam Al Akhal, Shammout joined the Palestine Liberation Organization as the Director of Arts and National Culture in 1965, while also holding the positions of Secretary General of the Union of Palestinian Artists and Secretary General of the Union of Arab Artists. After the Isr 3/4 li invasion of Beirut in 1982, Shammout then relocated to Kuwait, where he was once again forced to leave in the wake of the Gulf War. He fnally settled in Amman until his untimely death. His life was thus marked by continuous exodus, of Palestinian communities, as result of wars in his departure from Palestine, Beirut, and Kuwait respectively. Shammout’s hallmark was in his visual articulation of the experience of the Nakba, the representation of history of Palestinian struggle and the dream of the future. His paintings sought to capture a moment to portray the unfolding of the people’s story of dispossession and so adopted the practice of utilising symbolic references borrowed from verbal imagery exemplifed within his visual representations or through his poetic titles, in turn illustrating the sense of determination to regain the lost homeland. Developing a distinct visual style, his practice became shared by other painters and writers, and was part of the articulation of Palestinian national and cultural identity in a time in which Palestinians struggled for recognition of their rights and national aspirations. Christie’s is honoured to be ofering, directly from the artist’s Estate, the seminal work of his artistic career, Odyssey of a People from 1980. An impressive 6 metres long it is an expression of the artist and native country’s dramatic experience. The result of a relentless dedicated efort of over four months of daily work, this spectacular canvas, driven by emotion and passion is strikingly articulated. His wife, Tamam Al-Akhal who was instrumental in the development of Shammout’s career recalls his sense of restlessness and urgency of his need to encapsulate in a single painting the history and experience of the Palestinian people. Never before has anything of this depth, quality of artistic mastery and clear depiction of the artist’s own dreams, hopes and burdens with such emotional intensity been ofered before at auction and is a homage to the legacy that Ismail Shammout has imparted to Arab art history. Sharing with the world both his own sorrow and that of the Palestinian people, Odyssey of a People manages to simultaneously captivate, shock and emotionally grasp those who view it. Completed in 1980, this phenomenal painting was frst exhibited in 1981 in Dar Al-Karama in Beirut, later travelling to Damascus at the Union of Arab Artists, Malaysia, Kuwait and the Jordan National Museum. The painting later travelled to Palestine for exhibition at the request of Sakher Habash, at Dar al Karama Gallery in Ramallah, where it was exhibited in 1996. Fear for the safety of the painting during the siege on Presidential compound and Palestinian political leadership in 2002 led Habash to quickly remove the work from the gallery, hiding it in his home, where his wife folded it and kept it in a pillowcase for fear of it being appropriated by Isr 3/4 l authorities. It remained hidden there for several years until the family were fnally able to fnd a safe passage for the work to be returned to Amman. In an efort to continue to promote the artist’s hopes and dreams for his native land as he originally intended for his painting to, Christie’s thus hopes to shed light on the artist’s remarkable skill and importance in the placement of Palestinian art history. Reading, as in the Arabic language, from right to left, in several almost separate sections, this monumental painting tells of the historical events that have unfolded within Palestinian history, from the Nakba, the subsequent wars of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, the establishment of the PLO, the continued sense of despair amongst the Palestinian people that is juxtaposed against a sense of hope and unity under the symbol of the Palestinian fag and Fedayeen, all the way to a dreamlike expression of liberation, hope and faith of a peace and freedom. It was Shammout’s intention to map out the odyssey of his own people, a dream of returning home that was sadly never to be realised. ISMAIL SHAMMOUT ODYSSEY OF A PEOPLE Ismail Shammout and his wife, the artist Tamam Al-Akhal. Courtesy of the artist’s family. Odyssey of a People on display at the exhibition hall of the Beirut Arab University, 1982. Courtesy of the artist’s family. In the furthest right hand corner the aggressor is depicted as a gigantic barbarian with faring hair; vicious and inhuman he appears as a mammoth war machine, with canons, machine guns and oil pipes – a reference to the European, American and British assault on oil and consequent establishment of the Isr 3/4 li state. Painted in dark and foreboding colours, his jarring presence is ofset by the blazing red and angry sun in the background, burning against the gloomy blues of the ominous sky exemplifying this state of attack. Meanwhile the unarmed and defenceless Palestinians consisting of men and women and children of villages protect themselves with outstretched arms, pushing back as much as they can. Amongst the masses, the face of Abd Al-Qadir Al-Husayni, one of the most prominent leaders of the Palestinian rebellion in the 1930’s stands out as does the fgure prominent in We Shall Return, paying homage to the road to exile, the armed struggle that Shammout experienced frst-hand. Moving across the composition, a monumental mother fgure appears, embracing and protecting children in her arms as she looks out towards the viewer in despair. Especially during the 1980s, Palestine was often represented as the motherland, a motherly fgure in literature and art. Embodying the homeland, she held the attributes of the protector and nurturer of the people. Abd Al-Qadir Al-Husayni. Ismail Shammout, We Shall Return, 1954. Courtesy of the artist’s family. In Odyssey of a People the exodus from Palestine and the loss of the land is symbolised through children who are cloaked only in the Palestinian fag to protect their modesty. Vulnerable and scared of the unknown, they cling onto the only element of hope that remains of solace to them; the promise of a renewed Palestine. To their left, the background is a flled landscape of tents, in reference to the thousands of refugees who were forced to fee their homes. Behind them, a fgure who has dared to speak out peers out behind the bars of a jail cell, watching on as the tumultuous scene unfolds. The people huddle in fear, clutching each other as blood red sky looms above and people wonder into the unknown. Although the image conveys a tragic mood Shammout did not intend for his masterpiece to be entirely full of gloom. Simultaneously he inserts symbolic references that imply inner strength and determination; in the centre one sees a cactus tree, a symbol of the Palestinian people’s resoluteness and endurance despite oppression, killing and imprisonment. The young Palestinians’ insatiable appetite for learning and education despite their plight is represented by the determined children studying by gaslight. As if to evoke a sense of hope for the new generation, Shammout counters this positivity with a reminder of reality through diferent forms of aggression and oppression imposed on the people; families are forced to be separated from each other and are foreshadowed by group of threatening soldiers cloaked in black and blue overtones that approach the scene. Juxtaposed against a group of blindfolded political prisoners dressed in white – the colour of innocence – Shammout breaks this palpable tension with the face of a Feda’i (Palestinian Freedom fghter). Occupying a central position in the painting, he represents a shift in mood of the painting. His face, as large as the aggressor illustrated on the far right, is wrapped in the famous black and white Kefiyeh, that emanates a light as if a beacon of hope, a symbol of the cause. His tanned face and red eyes represent the countless days and nights he had spent in vigilant and selfess sacrifce to protect and bring dignity and freedom back to his people. Directly below the Feda’i, an eerie prediction of what was to become the First Intifada, that erupted in 1987 (7 years after the work’s completion). It is not the frst, nor indeed the last time that Shammout would venerate the Fedayeen in his compositions. An icon of hope and resistance, this political symbolism was intended to promote and champion a nationalist sentiment amongst the diaspora. In Odyssey of a People, this hero is looking away from his aggressor towards a brighter future on the far left. It is thus at this point that the composition shifts into a positive and celebratory sense of romanticism. ISMAIL SHAMMOUT ODYSSEY OF A PEOPLE Isr 3/4 l and Palestine in 1948. © Bridgeman Images. Political posters designed by Ismail Shammout. A row of Fedayeen march forward in proud unison towards a brighter future; a reference to the formation of the PLO. Suddenly it is as though spring is in the air, fowers are in bloom and white doves fll the skies while children and women dance in merriment, in the same jovial spirit Shammout would later instil in Al Farah (sold at Christie’s Dubai, October 2015, price realised;
