From theatre to the wide world of fine art Sunday, 25 July 2010 05:46

Doha: The Director of the Section for Youth Centres at the Qatari Ministry of Culture, Arts and Heritage Salman Al Malik inaugurated last week the first exhibition by the artist Abdullah Dasmal Al Kuwari at Waqif Art Centre.

The exhibition is one of many activities to celebrate Doha capital of Arab Culture for the year 2010.

This is Al Kuwari’s first exhibition. He is an old hand with theatre decorations. He had taken part in making stage decorations for more than 30 plays.

Al Kuwari’s paintings teem with artistic riches, which reflects positively on the fine art movement in Qatar.

“Good ideas are always the launching pad of my work,” Al Kuwari said. “Designing for the theatre, in which play texts are an important basis, has influenced my career greatly,” he added.

He said painting differed in that it focused on the transfer of visual codes and forms into pictures.

He noted that his exposure to rectangular shapes imbued his work with remarkable profundity.

“This was so powerful that it possessed the authority to open my e-exit gate from the parking lot and this was the beginning of meditation on the card and remnants of the visual elements led me to express them in a series of my works,” he said.

Al Kuwari combines realism and abstraction in confronting difficulties related to modernity. All his paintings are interrelated by philosophical and existential questions over the value of man and identity. These questions rely heavily on numbers in a bid to point out the importance of these numbers for man’s life.

He says a change in the order of numbers can change man’s life for good.

This is what makes Al Kuwari’s experience with exhibitions different. He says there is a big degree of interdependence among the paintings. He mentioned the example of his five paintings, which are called Movement, where the artist tries to monitor the movement of the blue box and the lines associated with a dramatic move from left to right making a beautiful visual scene.

This is probably one of few times during which Al Kuwari uses theatrical dramatic methods in his work to create a world of moving objects in front of the bare eyes of his viewers.

The colours are strong in order to fit in the drama, making the whole thing look as if it is a stage performance.

“Al kuwari’s career is rich and everybody knows him by his designs,” Al Malik said. “This man has an indelible signature on the theatrical scene of Qatar,” he added.

Al Malik said the exhibition was an echo of Al Kuwari’s theatrical interests, which was normal for an artist who managed to carve an important niche in the theatre world.

“This adds yet more riches to fine art in Qatar,” he said. “I advise the public to benefit from this experience and visit this exhibition,” he added.

THE PENINSULA