Artists at the third round of the Luxor International Painting Symposium added their own special touches to an ancient landscape. Nevine El-Aref admires their work Farmers in colourful galabiyas (gowns) holding large jars on their heads; painted mud-brick houses decorated with foliage; semi-naked Pharaonic dancers wearing headdresses; painted wooden boats; tiles decorated with Nile flowers; mummies; multi-coloured pyramids and stripped rugs are this year's work by the artists participating in the Luxor International Painting Symposium (LIPS). Every piece reflects the artist's own vision of the process of life, or else the mood that caught him or her while painting in the agreeable ambiance of Luxor, which combines an individual and natural environment with the great and glorious civilisation of ancient Egypt. Australian painter Katherine Roland stands before three small pieces painted in black and white on a trunk of a date palm. With a soft smile, Roland told Al-Ahram Weekly that she used pieces from nature to reflect her special vision of Luxor. "I used the encaustic technique in my work," Roland said. Encaustic painting involves using heated beeswax to which coloured pigments are added. "This is a symbol of the sun with its light and shine, and there is the moon, which reflects darkness," Roland told the Weekly. She added that she used the trunk of a palm tree in her work because it reflected the sand and the desert nature of Luxor. "It also has the same colour of the town's gigantic monuments," she said. Her third item is a piece of palm trunk wrapped in linen bandages like an ancient Egyptian mummy. Jenny Page from the United States produced a very simple painting that showed her own experience in Egypt. Her work consists of a triptych depicting Nile flowers on pa purple, green and dark blue background. "When I first strolled along the Cairo and Luxor streets, I was overwhelmed by the wonderful and marvellous monuments and landmarks in Egypt, which I found really perplexing," she said. "How could I do a painting that summed up my feelings for these gigantic monuments?" She felt she could produce nothing that compared with them, and so she had to come up with something different. "What stirred my attention most were the motifs drawn on street pavements," Page told the Weekly. "Some were decorated with flower motifs, and others were painted in geometrical abstracts. And from here I did my three paintings." French artist Sophie Valletie drew her inspiration Luxor's local tapestries (kilims), and painted coloured stripes on a white background. Iraqi artist Soheil Badour, who has been a successful artist for 30 years, said that in Luxor he had experienced something very special that he had never encountered before. "Standing in front of these colossal monuments and immersing myself in the details charged my artistic instinct," Badour said. This is quite evident in his paintings of women with the classical facial features of the ancient Egyptian playing the nay (Oriental flute). "Luxor is the town of mystery, and the spirit of history is revealed in everything that remains of its creativity that speaks of the philosophy of man and his temporal and cosmic relations," Culture Minister Farouk Hosni told the Weekly. He called it "a town that inspired and energised the imagination." This, he says, is why it was chosen by the ministry to host this meeting of artists, so it could recap the enrichment it bestowed on plastic artists in the 1950s and 60s. "Luxor is now evidence of a new vision of the future, a vision that recognises the importance of international interactivity," Hosni says. LIPS, he continued, allowed every artist to enjoy the wide scope of intellect, where there was no limit to creativity and imagination. "Luxor, the town of beauty, art and history, will guide this generation to the glorious past and a glowing future," Hosni said. "With this round, LIPS gained a new look," said artist Mohamed Tarawi, a member of the LIPS committee. The LIPS concept has grown from being a symposium of painters where 25 artists from all over the globe gathered to paint the town's landscape and natural scenes. Tarawi says this gave out the wrong impression. "It is a cultural and human demonstration that unites different cultures and civilisations in one place, where artists can exchange ideas, theories and visions of art," Tarawi said. It also introduced another facet of Luxor as an international core of culture and art. "It is a cultural dialogue through paintings." LIPS is one of the various activities to revive the town set up by the Luxor International Atelier (LIA) in the mid-1900s in the village of Gourna on Luxor's west bank. Mohamed Abu Seada, head of the Cultural Development Fund, says the Luxor town council has allocated a 9,000-sq-m plot in New Gourna to house the LIA, where ateliers will be constructed in the Hassan Fathi architectural style. The LIA aims to provide an opportunity for creative artists from around the world to produce their art in a historical atmosphere, surrounded by the diversity of ancient Egyptian monuments with their distinguished forms and images. It also hopes to encourage new artistic visions with extended historical roots that can further enrich the art movement in Egypt and further afield. This aim, Abu Seada pointed out, would be implemented through an offer of grants lasting for three months for 25 artists, in addition to a three-month course of art studies for another 25 young artists to develop their painting and drawing skills. Courses in photography, graphics and sculpture would be also provided. "Luxor is really a very inspiring place," LIPS commissar Ibrahim Ghazala says. He adds that there, within the vicinity of the desert and thus in tune with the era of Pharaonic history, the sense of serenity and divinity is overwhelming and artists will be able to focus more on the immersion of their creativity. According to LIPS regulations, as in previous rounds, the development fund provides artists with all the basic materials they need such as paints, brushes and palettes. Each artist has a per diem allowance of $1,000. They see this sum as being a little lower than sums offered by similar symposia. At two weeks, the symposium is also a little longer than most. He added that all the paintings submitted to the LIPS were shown at a special exhibition in Taz House in mediaeval Cairo and afterwards at the Creative Centre in Alexandria.
