The grand opening exhibition of Picasso East, a branch of the Zamalek-based Picasso Gallery in Al-Tagamoua Al-Khamis area designed to house the work of pioneer artists in all genres, is showing works by some 50 major Egyptian artists including Youssef Francis, Georges Bahgory, Salah Taher, Hend Adnan, Omar Al-Nagdi, Wagih Yassa and Salah Hammad. Among the greatest of the greats is the late painter Salah Taher. Taher obtained his art degree at the Faculty of Fine Arts, Cairo in 1934, where he started his career, becoming a lecturer at the same faculty until 1954. A prolific artist, he is the recipient of the State Award in 1974, the 1996 Biennial Alexandria First Prize and the Guggenheim Foundation award among many others. In 2001, Taher was honoured together with Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz during the soft opening of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, which was entitled “The brush and the pen”. A book of his work. Although Taher is rooted in academic paintings, his interest in colour led to his liberation from traditional values, and his style progressed from realistic to figurative symbolism, and finally to abstraction, with which he achieved great acclaim. The distinctive feature of Taher's art is his mastery of a bold palette and his use of various tools, especially such hard tools as the knife which he used to spread transparent coats of diluted paint. In the 1960s, he was appointed head of the Museum of Modern Art. In 1962, he was appointed director of the Opera House, and in 1966 he joined Al-Ahram newspaper, dedicating over 35 paintings to the Al-Ahram Organisation, some of which continue to decorate the walls of its building. Overall, he produced 15,000 paintings and held over 80 exhibitions in Egypt, Venice, New York, San Francisco, Geneva, Beirut, Kuwait and Jeddah. The exhibition runs through 16 February.
