Is documentation the best way to commemorate great pioneer artists? Rania Khallaf attends another show by Walid Aouni Last week, Walid Aouni�'s Modern Dance Troupe (MDT) presented a show on the large theatre of the Cairo Opera House. The 50-minute show was put on to celebrate the "Centennial of Egyptian Arts", which sounds a tad official; the show, however, was one to enjoy. The Faculty of Fine Arts was established rather more than 100 years ago on 12 May 1908, and from it most of the pioneering Egyptian artists graduated. The show was divided into several short episodes, each one dedicated to one of these pioneers of art in Egypt who at one time studied at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Zamalek, Cairo. The national spirit is embedded in the hearts of its artists, says Walid Aouni, founder and head of the MDT. "They carry in their hearts the importance of this glorious country, which is the cradle of enlightenment and arts," he adds. In this particular show, scenography plays a brilliant role in attracting the attention of the audience: giant portraits of each artist and symbols of his work and themes that are current in his work are brilliantly demonstrated. A large image and the name of the artist appeared on the background curtain at the beginning of each episode, rendering the show a clear documentary character. I should have liked the show more had it carried one theme that reflected the spirit of art in Egypt during the last century; however, asked why he tended to documentation in almost all his recent shows, Aouni said that it was hard to visualise this particular show in any other way. "Each of these artists has a different world, different tools, a different time and career. I had to study the works and history of each and every one of them to be able to visualise his short life on stage," Aouni told Al-Ahram Weekly. A graduate of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Brussles in 1977, Aouni is perhaps more prepared to present this kind of show than a more conservatively-nurtured entrepreneur might be. It comes as no surprise that his shows over the last 10 years have included those on Tahia Halim, Shadi Abdel-Salaam, Mahmoud Mukhtar and Mahmoud Said, all of them pioneers of a different sort. The music that accompanied each sketch is definitely different, and it is a hard task because, again, each artist has a unique character and style of music that speaks for his work. The music included compositions by Tarek Sharara, as well as Egyptian folk music, and recordings made by Shadi Abdel-Salaam. The opening scene was more than fantastic: it featured a giant puppet show, with most of the characters taken from the legendary puppet show Al-Leila al-Kebira (the Big Night), created by Nagui Shaker, and written by the popular Ammiya poet Salah Jahin with the music of Sayed Mekkawi. This was cheerful enough, but most of the other sketches cast in a gloomy shadow. The main line running through all the was the dancer, the character of a Fine Arts student who discovers the horizons of art, and in so doing rediscovers the works of the nine artists who influenced the diverse artistic trend in Egypt �ê" Nagui Shaker, Hussein Fawzi, Gamal El-Segeini, Hamed Nada, Salah Abdel-Karim, Abdel-Hadi El-Gazar, Hussein Bikar, Hassan Fathi znd Mahmoud Mukhtar. One of the most lively sketches, or rather vignettes, was the one dedicated to Hussein Bikar, who painted those cheerful Nubian and other rural women. The dance to the Nubian rhythm and the drums and traditional instruments added another spirit to the scene. More symbols and mystics were there in the vignette dedicated to El Gazar, with his surrealistic characters and metaphysical people �ê" too many symbols actually, moving round at such a high speed that the audience could hardly blink or draw breath. The final scene was dedicated to leading sculptor Mahmoud Mukhtar, who swept on stage in a wave of Khamasin wind accompanied by country women who emerged from the canal mud and vanished into the desert air. The last scene, which was longer than the others, was when Aouni appeared on stage to present the spirit of Mukhtar. The sculptor was in constant confusion, moving from one statue to another as he tried to unveil its reality, and giving birth to his female statues. In the end, though, when Mukhtar died, the death scene was too long, boring even, and more dramatic than it needed to be to the extent that it made me feel it was the end of art scene in Egypt as we know it. "Death is itself a series of scenes," Aouni told the Weekly. "Death also involves optimism, because we cannot run away from it. It is the only acknowledged truth in life. "Actually, there is no more great art today. It is a world phenomenon, not just an Egyptian one. Great art had stopped by the 1960s, even in the cinema and other fields of art; there are no more big names or leaders in any field." Last year Aouni founded a new troupe for traditional dancers called Fursan Al-Sharq (Eastern Cavalry). For seven nights the troupe is presenting a show at Al-Gomhuria theatre called "The Greatest Street", centred on the Fatimid period through the historical background and environment of Al-Muizz Eldin Allah Alfatimi Street in the Cairo�'s mediaeval district.
