A German artist re-evaluates the elusive scent of Cairo's faint greenery with an outsider's piercing eye. Gamal Nkrumah praises her pictorial plants on show at the SafarKhan Gallery in Zamalek Barbara Armbruster's "Spearmint and Female Sculpture", gouache, pencil on paper, 150x100 cm, makes its presence felt by the sprigs that have silvered at summer's end. Yet here we are in midsummer, and the pretty leaves drop down provocatively on the pavement that curiously resembles the shell sand of some seaside promenade. This is not Alexandria, mind you. I fathom that it is Cairo with all its leaden dreariness and two luscious, vulva-like strawberries served on white linen under a sepulchral sculpture of a female nude. It would be obscene to veil such an erotic scene. Yet there is something spiritual and sublime in those piercing crimson strawberries, or are they blushing pink peaches or ruby red roses with their petals peeled as the ashen leaves creep up behind them to devour their vibrating liveliness? "Pomegranate", gouache ink, pencil on paper 100x150 cm, is peculiarly reminiscent of Adam and Eve under the heavenly fig tree, except that the fig leaves are scattered on this windless afternoon and the sun scorches everything, living and dead, in its path. So what about the pomegranate? I presume all that remains of the fruit are its succulent seeds. The peel, parched like Cairo, has succumbed to summer's merciless sun and shriveled up into blurry ochre. Cairo is one of the greatest historical constructs of all time. Armbruster strives to spot the green. "I am fascinated by the green alleys in the streets of Cairo, by the plants, the little trees along or in front of buildings. This stands for more than only the desire for green. I started to take a closer look at the various kinds of potted plants in the streets, which I could find almost everywhere. This spreads gentleness in the streets and a specific kind of intimacy that has captivated me so much. But I believe that it comprises different levels: the past and today's life, even the feeling of the people living and working in the city of Cairo," Armbruster ruminates philosophically. These are lively observations. Hers is an anatomy of a city. Armbruster's search for the green and the scent of life -- primaeval life that it -- is in the listless heat of Cairo's summertime afternoon proves to be no pointless exercise. "Plants had an essential meaning for our ancestors," Armbruster declares. "Where plants grew there was water and life. Even though there is no necessity to settle close to a sea or a river anymore, the original sensation of water and life is still part of us," the artist muses. She leaves her curtains undrawn so we can clearly see the burst of green, of water and of life sprouting on the street. Armbruster's Cairo is uninhabited, or perhaps its people are abstractions. Yet her Cairo is no ghost town. Armbruster's Cairo has a life as compelling as any city of its size. Yet she is more curious about the nooks and crannies of Cairo. She loiters about the street corners, the crevices, cracks and the sculptures of the city with palette and paintbrush in hand. Her colours are subdued. And what she terms greens are more of greys than anything vaguely resembling the verdant colours. Still her paintings are covered with plants. Olives, perhaps. But nothing emerald is in sight. Beige and brown abound. As such, Armbruster's list of concepts of colour does not look so outlandish in a city like Cairo. Her colours are echoed throughout the city. It is the profusion of leaves that hint of the green. Her leaves come in all shapes and sizes. Given that, you might have thought that an exhibition entitled The Green, the Street and the Scent of Life would be a pretty racy depiction of Cairo. Alas, it is not. It is more retrospective, I imagine. It is serene and soulful. Melodramatic Armbruster's exhibition might well be, but it is also a sensible and sober observation of a city that she obviously adores. Smitten with Cairo, Armbruster awakens to the dawn of awareness, to time immemorial. Her paintings, unwittingly perhaps, reflect the power of Shu, the ancient Egyptian god of dry air. Others suggest the vitality of Tefnut, the goddess of moist air. Geb and Nut, the Earth god and Sky goddess respectively are ever-present. But it is the great ocean of Nun, "non-being" that it truly omnipresent in her masterful paintings. Shu and Tefnut set out across the water evoking the perfumes, the scent of life and with it the green -- the agrarian lifestyle, much later followed by the urbane street life. The symbolism of ancient Egypt is not at once visible in Armbruster's works, yet in no other city does the "original sensation of water", the primeval ocean of Nun, so becomingly recedes. The artist captures something of this ancient grandeur on canvas. "Fountain", oil and mixed media on canvas, 24x30 cm, does burst with a splash of colour. Though not particularly the colours you would associate with water. An egg yolk yellow predominates, followed in close succession with the oddest of tweed greens. Bedtime blue and dark chocolate curiously encircled by lashings of cream complete the most compelling picture. Armbruster's Cairo gives the impression of a city of simple pleasures. In spite of the absence of colour, bold and brash colour that is, one can still see the attraction. "Free Breeze", oil and mixed media on canvas, 24x30 cm, is perhaps the most colourful of Armbruster's paintings on show at the SafarKhan Gallery. Again the egg yolk features, as well as the olive green and the cream. Then there is a touch of burnished peach. This feast looks like a delicately flavoured dish that has gourmands travelling from all over the world to taste.
