Then What? 1965 – 2010 is an exhibition that illustrates the direct (and indirect) furthering of Kayyali’s committed spirit in nearly a dozen works by some of the Middle East’s most influential artists. Drawn from the Samawi Collection of Art, which contains over 3,000 outstanding modern and contemporary international works and has a special influence on the Middle East, these superb examples of Arab art span over fifty years. Together they demonstrate the many ways in which Kayyali and a handful of his colleagues paved the way for the fashioning of a socially conscious milieu in regional art.
From a profound state of mourning that speaks of unbearable alienation in Safwan Dahoul’s introspective Dream 4 (2008) to Oussama Diab’s powerful use of the imagery and symbolism that has come to define Palestinian life under Israeli occupation in The New Mona Lisa series (2010), these carefully selected works underscore the great extent to which Arab artists have continued to reflect upon the ravaged state of our modern world with an outpouring of grief, optimism and defiance through virtually every school of art.
While creating a complex framework in which such seminal pieces can be considered within the larger context of modern and contemporary Arab art Then What? 1965 – 2010 also provides a look into Ayyam Gallery’s upcoming cultural initiatives, which will include the curating of museum-quality exhibitions from private and public collections at its newly inaugurated Ayyam Art Center in Dubai.
