This year's Youth Salon took the 25 January Revolution as its theme, bringing together high-quality work by the younger generation of artists, says Mohamed Mursi The 22nd edition of the Cairo Youth Salon, held at the Arts Palace in the Opera House in Zamalek, featured 250 paintings, graphic works, sculptures, photographs and multi-media pieces about the 25 January Revolution. It was the first Youth Salon to take place after the Revolution, and many among the audience were activists from across the political spectrum. Hend al-Filafi, who won a painting prize, said she had been concerned to create a dynamic composition in a single colour that was inspired by the tumultuous changes taking place in the country. Abdel Hadi al-Weshahi, a professional sculptor, said that he had been pleased with the energy of the exhibition and proud of the achievements of the younger generation. In work displayed at the Salon, Shaima Mohammad, a literature student in college, focused on representing the rebellious aspects of the revolutionary generation. For his part, Ahmad Sabri al-Qott, a student at the Art Education College in Cairo, had produced graphic work that bordered on political satire. The Youth Salon had been postponed twice because of differences over the selection, with a previous selections committee having been disbanded after it had decided to accept all the work submitted for the show. This decision, the committee said, had been designed to "allow all artists to show their work at the Salon, turning it into a celebration of the work of young artists who took part in the Revolution." This unusual decision was rescinded by culture minister Emad Abu Ghazi, who ordered all works to be screened before the show. In the event, Abdel-Wahab Abdel-Mohsen, who served on the judging panel at the Salon, said that he had been impressed by the variety of works presented at the event, adding that most were of high quality and reflected the spirit of the Revolution. Following the disbanding of the original committee, the new selections committee had established a programme of art workshops to run in parallel to the Salon. These will continue throughout the exhibition, with works produced in the workshops being shown to the public in the final week. This year's top prize was won jointly by Osama Abdel-Monem from Minya University and May Hamdi from Helwan University. The top prize has a monetary value of 20,000 EGP, with a second group of prizes worth 10,000 EGP followed by various merit awards of 5,000 EGP. The value of the prizes is currently being revised, but winners of the 10,000 EGP prizes included Ahmad Qassem (photography), Bassem Abdel-Galil (graphics), Mostafa Samir (graphics), Hend al-Falafli (painting) and Ibrahim Saad (installation). Abu Ghazi, who inaugurated the show, said that this year it had seen an amazing transformation, with a broader vision and artists exploring new ground in terms of technique and materials. Although the main topic of the Salon was the Revolution, some of the winning pieces dealt with other subjects, prompting some to criticise the judges for not focusing on the announced theme of this year's event. Salah al-Miligi, the organiser of the show, said that the event as a whole had reflected the idea of change implicit in the Revolution, with the winning pieces being those that had most deserved the prizes. "The pieces reflected the new air of freedom in the country. Some were not as artistically mature as we might have hoped, but future shows are bound to show artistic and revolutionary progress in the country," he said. Art should aim to reflect social circumstances, al-Miligi said. "At this historic juncture, change is the foremost idea in the country as a whole, which is why we used it as the theme of this year's Salon. The event has also shown that Egypt has produced a new generation of critics able to gauge the mood of society and constitute a backbone for the art movement at home and abroad." Echoing al-Miligri, Reda Abdel-Salam, the Salon's president, said that this year's competition had been a turning point in the history of the event. "The exhibition was based on transparency and objectivity, since we wanted to give equal opportunities to all artists, while retaining the highest aesthetic standards," he said. According to Khaled Hafez, the Salon's curator, the show had been the first of its kind in Egypt and clear testimony of the positive effects of the 25 January Revolution. Hafez, who worked 18-hour days to put together the show, said that the result had been well worth the efforts of all those involved. Other winners included Ahmad al-Hoseini, Hatem al-Sayyed and Mohammad Kamal (ceramics), Ahmad Bedeir and Ayman Ibrahim (computer graphics and video), Amir Fekri and Maged Mikhail (sculpture), Nura Seif and Karim Basyouni (photography), Wafaa Yahya and Hosnia Hanafi (performance art), and Asmaa Geneidi (video). Yara Makkawi won the Ahmad Bayouni Martyr Prize, and Fatemah Ezzat the Zeyad Bakir Martyr Prize. Hossam Sawwah won a two-week residency at the Egyptian Academy in Rome, and Haytham Hedaya, Ahmad Sabri, Mohammad Moftah and Tamer Shahin won "royal" prizes of 5,000 EGP each. Heba Abdel-Mohsin won first prize for art and literary criticism, taking home 3,000 EGP. Second prize of 2,000 EGP went to Suzan Abdel-Wahed, and a third prize, of 1,000 EGP, went to Saleha Farghali. The selections committee excluded several mosaic pieces from the exhibition, recommending them for show in other exhibitions. Next year's Youth Salon will take the Arab Spring and the protest movements around the region as its theme, and UNESCO and the Arab League will be invited to co-sponsor the event.
