Gamal Nkrumah writes on an exhibition of works by the Swiss artist Margot Veillon, who spent her life in Egypt Looking at Life, an exhibition of works by the late Swiss artist Margot Veillon at the Sharjah Art Gallery on the American University in Cairo's new campus outside Cairo, opens up a lifetime's work to the visitor. Here are works that detail life in Egypt over the many decades that Veillon lived in the country from the first half of the last century onwards, together with sketches and self- portraits that record the artist's developing sense of herself. "When she died, we discovered that both her parents were also buried in Egypt in the Swiss Cemetery in Old Cairo," Mark Linz, director of the American University in Cairo Press and one of the organisers of the exhibition, told the Weekly. "She was born in Egypt and she lived here throughout her life. She was always also determined to die here," he said. A great many of Veillon's works relate to her life in Egypt and to the small niches she explored in the variety of Cairene life. Being of a generous nature, the human stories implicit in Cairo street scenes did not escape her eye. Works such as Gossip, Telepathy, The Waiting Wives and The Fortune Teller hint at Veillon's engagement with sometimes occult forms of communication, while her paintings of everyday life -- The Rice Harvest, The Grafting of Trees and Windows and Trees -- show her response to the natural environment. Visiting the exhibition with friends who had known Veillon well, I found myself especially admiring the many self-portraits Veillon produced throughout her life, four of which are on display at the AUC show. Veillon was not a woman who flattered herself in her portraits, someone remarked, though this was meant as a compliment to her painting. "She had quite a temper," someone else remembered. "She was not someone who always suffered fools gladly." This aspect of the artist's personality was not, however, visible in her paintings. The AUC's sponsorship of the present exhibition continues an involvement the university has long had with Veillon and her work, notably through the AUC Press's decision to support art historian Bruno Ronfard in his cataloguing of Veillon's oeuvre and in its publication of the results in several sumptuous volumes. The Press has also been active in supporting exhibitions by Veillon and in fielding requests from foreign publishers and purchasers. Many of Veillon's works are still in the late artist's home in Maadi, which at one time was famed both for the delights it held in store for those lucky enough to be invited to view them and for the difficulty of receiving such an invitation. Veillon throughout her life kept her own counsel, and while she was always a famous member of the Cairo arts scene she was reluctant to move in artistic circles. For a while she was close to the late Prince Hassan Hassan, himself a painter, and other leading figures also received invitations to the Maadi residence. When Veillon started painting in Egypt during the first half of the last century, European artists came to Cairo to share in what was then a thriving expatriate arts scene, and Veillon was able to pursue her painting in Egypt while also fostering an international career. Today, her pictures are once again capturing the attention of collectors worldwide, this new generation of buyers being attracted by Veillon's ability to capture something of the country's long history and its traditions of fantastic tales and storytelling. Such new collectors are looking at Veillon's work with fresh eyes, though it is probably also true that some of them at least are aware of the investment opportunity that any sale of Veillon's pictures would bring. For some years now, Veillon's work has been commanding ever-increasing prices at auction, and there is no doubt that today there is an eager market of potential buyers. Prices for some of Veillion's pictures now reach LE 55,000, and of the 80 or so paintings on display at the AUC show, some 62 are for sale, with 16 being reserved for buyers. According to sources at the gallery, most contemporary purchasers are Egyptian nationals, something which gives the lie to any easy assumption that Veillon's pictures of Egypt only appeal to foreigners. Commenting on the show, Brian Curling, the curator, focuses on Veillon's work as a form of self-exploration. "From the highest precipices to the deepest voids," he says, "Margot Veillon was always a subject for Margot Veillon, Looking through her archive of more than 6,000 works of art one can detect and piece together the personal narrative of Margot Veillon." For Linz, there are many sides to Veillon's work, but he also stresses that this "is a hugely exciting time to be interested in Veillon's work, and the exhibition's first intention is to propagate the message embedded in her works." That message, he says, has something to do with Veillon's life in Egypt, but also with Egypt itself. Works such as Herd of Goats on Yahmum Hills, Moon at Dawn, and Three Winnowers concentrate on the Egyptian landscape, emphasising what the well- known Egyptian artist Gazbiyya Sirri has identified as Veillon's status as "a great, genuine artist and also a humanitarian full of love for human beings and nature." This exhibition forces any visitor to think beyond any narrow identification of the artist with labels such as those of nationality, race or gender. Veillon shows that such narrow confines did not determine her own responses to the country she came to know and love so well, and in her work she displays the full range of her responses to Egypt and the magnificent work it stimulated her to produce. Looking at Life, AUC Sharjah Art Gallery, 9 November -- 16 December 2008
