Safwan Dahoul. CELIA TOPPING[/caption]Safwan Dahoul’s distinctive canvases, characterized by elegant curvature of line and the Pharaonic-eyed, heavy-browed subjects, all have all shared the same title for the last three decades: Dream. Yet what is most striking about this latest series of paintings, showcased at Ayyam Gallery in Dahoul’s first solo UK show, is the shift away from the muted sepia palette that usually pervades his work. Here we see only monochrome; stark black and white images peer out at the viewer from the walls, and the heavy-lidded eyes reveal a new emotion in Dahoul’s deeply personal work: fear.
This is the first body of work the artist has painted since his enforced move to Dubai from his native Syria, about eight months ago. It is therefore not difficult to comprehend the emotional, physical and psychological turmoil that has informed this shift, considering the ongoing violence in his homeland.
Dahoul seems a little uncomfortable when he is asked to explain the meaning of his latest works, even in conversation with his gallerist and friend, Khaled Samawi, who founded the Ayyam Gallery and who is translating for him. Dahoul explains that he believes the artist has no place at the exhibition after the work has been created. The work should speak for itself; it is open to interpretation, and he does not want to impose what he believes on the viewer.
However, as Stephen Stapleton, Director and Founder of Edge of Arabia, who is collaborating with Ayyam on Dahoul's exhibition, comments, "now is a very important time for these dialogues to be opened up. Despite the deluge of media coverage, it is rare to get a subjective, poetic voice such as Dahoul’s."
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DreamP50 Safwan Dahoul. THE ARTIST/AYYAM GALLERY[/caption]
Five years ago, Dahoul’s wife, the subject and ‘storyteller’ of most of his paintings, died, and this marked a subtle change in his practice: he began numerating his Dream paintings. In retrospect, Dahoul says, his only regret is not starting to do this sooner. However, when he began calling his work Dream, he was not conscious of the fact that this would become his life’s work. He explains, ‘I’m trapped by one dream after another,” and, now, “this dream is really a game I play with myself.... How long can I prolong it? How long can I continue to dream and to paint dreams through eternity?”
Dahoul continues, explaining how the game is of fundamental importance to him. Never one to have played by the rules—he was told at art school never to paint in black and white—he feels the artist must enjoy and amuse himself in his studio, and not take himself too seriously. As several of the young Ayyam artists who were Dahoul’s students can testify, being overly serious and scholarly is not part of his make-up. However, he hastens to add, “It’s the work, the art itself, which is serious.”
The presence of recurring imagery and symbolism in Dahoul’s work is as evident in this new collection of work as ever. “I have a problem with existence and why we exist,” he explains, “so you need to have a certain set of symbols that support you and keep your feet on the ground.” For example, in discussing one of the key works from his Repetitive Dreams series, “Dream 42,” which depicts a giant sofa in a checkerboard effect with the numbers 1 to 2011 painted in the small squares, Dahoul talks about the chair representing the galaxy/ It is an idea he borrowed from The Verse of the Chair in the Qu’ran. If human existence began in square 1, and ended in 2011, when he finished the painting, there are still countless more squares on either side of the numbered ones. Dahoul is basically saying that “who we are in our own history, compared to the galaxy, is insignificant.”
Samawi has said that he believes Syrian art, such as that of Dahoul is “hyper-expressionist” because it is so deeply rooted in personal experience, thoughts and dreams, and so portrays what lies at the very heart of human existence. One of the latest key works, which perhaps best represents this, is “Dream P50,” a striking work depicting an angel figure looking back at the viewer, cowed, ashamed and fearful, with a city laid out in lights in the background. Above the city, the clouds are dark and foreboding and the bottom half of the painting fades to black. It is a melancholic image, filled with dread and disquiet. The mountain from which the angel views the city is Mount Qasioun, which overlooks Damascus. “Every person has his own angel, even a city has an angel to look after it,” says Dahoul. “But this angel has screwed you,” says Samawi. “It was supposed to look after Damascus, and look what’s happened.... What is the angel going to do for your city?” he demands. It is with great sadness that Dahoul turns to his friend and says, “She’s not going to do anything.”
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Safwan Dahoul, Repetitive Dreams, May 9 –June 15, 2013, Ayyam Gallery London and Edge of Arabia May 8 –June 2
