Lot 45: The Temple of Karnak

Mohammed Naghi (Egyptian, 1888-1956) The Temple of Karnak signed 'Naghi' (lower left) oil on board 19¼ x 29in. (49 x 73.5cm.) Painted circa 1930s

49 x 73.5cm.

circa 1930

Private Collection of Effat Naghi, Alexandria, thence by descent to the present owner.

'The goal of art, and its sole reason of being, is to create something monumental, something that lasts' . (The artist quoted in E.Naghi, "Naghi, L'Alexandrin", in Mohamed Naghi: Un Impressionniste Egyptien, Cairo 1988, p.14; translated from French). Mohammed Naghi was one of the intellectual founding fathers of Modern Egyptian art. Together with Gaston Zananiri, they launched the Alexandria Atelier in March 1935 which brought artists and writers together and regularly organised exhibitions. Furthermore, Naghi's lifelong passion to develop and improve his nation's arts placed him alongside fellow Alexandrian painter Mahmoud Sad and fellow Cairene sculptor Mahmoud Mokhtar as one of the pioneer painters of Modern Egyptian art. His iconic works are rare on the market and Christie's is honoured to feature this exquisite sun-lit scene by the Alexandrian Atelier founder in its sale, which comes directly from the estate of the artist's sister, Effat Naghi, one of Egypt's leading Modern female artists. Painted in Karnak most likely in the early 1930s, the present work epitomizes Naghi's vision of an art that encompassed his nation's cultural heritage yet that was presented in a universal and modern way throughout his unique painterly style. Naghi studied painting in Florence, Italy, following which his works were infused with a certain Romanticism and architectural approach, celebrating the Renaissance and particularly the revival of Greco-Roman architecture. The move from Romanticism to Impressionism in Naghi's oeuvre resulted from his travels to France in 1918. There, he resided in Giverny to learn from the father of Impressionism, Claude Monet (1840-1926) how to extract the spectrum of colours from the sunlight, exploring its luminosity and its optimism. Although he widely travelled for various diplomatic missions as an attach for the Egyptian Legation, from Brazil to Ethiopia, he often returned to his homeland, setting up various studios in Alexandria, Luxor and Memphis. In Le Temple de Karnak, the remnants of his Impressionist years have been overtaken by Naghi's characteristic warm palette and by his almost abstract approach in simplifying the composition. He seeks to only preserve the solid core masses of the temple and its surroundings, that he depicted with thick broad brushstrokes and vibrant colours. Three distinct horizontal bands of a fiery orange, topped by a bright beige colour heightened with warm pigments, and a heated brown and pink strip in the upper tier, define the depth and luminosity of the painting. Naghi adds a folkloric element to the architectural and natural grandeur of this quintessentially Egyptian scene of one of the landsmarks of Egyptian civilisation. In the foreground of his painting, he included a faceless Egyptian peasant self-absorbed in her craft. She seems to be floating in the painting's foreground and appears to be compositionally and proportionally detached from the rest of the scene, as if suspended in time. She observes the cradle of her origins and ensures the survival of her nation's traditional crafts despite the country's modernisation, raising national awareness to Egypt's history and traditions. This charming landscape further reveals Naghi's interest in Paul Gauguin's romantic primitive bold works and colours, that had predominated the works he produced in Ethiopia in 1932-1934, and that introduced a certain spirituality and durability to his other paintings, as exemplified in the present lot. 'Naghi not only painted with "air and light" but also with "lines and colours", in an architectural harmony, looking for a "proportional unit of measurement", where each of the elements are linked to others in a constant relationship'. (E. Naghi, "Naghi, L'Alexandrin", in Mohamed Naghi: Un Impressionniste Egyptien, Cairo 1988, p.14; translated from French).