Sad day for Arabic calligraphers
Below are few Al-Zahawi works from my collection, click on the image to enlarge
Again another coward attempt from the US-Zionists to wipe out our culture and heritage, master calligrapher Khalil Al-Zahawi was killed yesterday.
It is said that anyone in Iraq who wanted to be considered proficient in Arabic calligraphy had to have his seal of approval.
In his last interview on Fonon Al-Zahawi said:
Its lack of beauty, computer fonts are destroying Arabic calligraphy, lines are far from the rules.
in Iraq is taking its toll on all aspects of Iraqi culture, including the art of classical Arabic calligraphy. The BBC reported that Khalil al-Zahawiwas ambushed and killed on May 26th. For pictures of him at work and a few samples of his work, see Sad day for Arabic calligraphers.
LB thank you for the al jazeera video of the “great” merkava, ROFLMAO.
It’s as “great” as the colonizer humanity. I just absolutely love the way you write and how you put things to your readers.
Sorry LB, my last post was meant to be under the al jazeera video. oops. :)
[...] Roads to Iraq [...]
[...] managed to destroy the myth behind Israeli Merkava (Arabic: Markaba) tank. Google Video insideLinkSad day for Arabic calligraphersRoads to Iraq2007-05-28 06:40:57Below are few Al-Zahawi works from my collection, click on the image [...]
Why blame ‘US-Zionist’s when the truth is that Khalil al-Zahawi on only the latest Iraqi artist to be killed by the Iraqis themselves? Milita, Sunni or Shia, or mindless thug- all they value is greed and hate. They destroy even their communities by looting power cables and threatening rebuilding works. All they have achieved since the war is adapting to destruction, not rebuilding or creating. And by killing Khalil al-Zahawi they show that even culture, and art is valueless to them.
O’Briain
Why don’t start with reading this
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7199.htm
[...] More here. Picture of al-Zahawi working here. [...]
Good God. I’m American, Protestant and I’m far more fond of Israel and her people than anything else within 1500 miles in any given direction.
I don’t have much sense for the aesthetic; I can’t read Arabic, I’ve no eye for art. I only went looking for examples of his work for my friend, who loved it and, through it, came to respect him a great deal. News of his death hammered her; truth told, I’d like to hurt the people who did this myself.
You mar his work by setting it down with such hate in your heart and mind.
sadly , world history is chock full of angry, hateful people wiping out art and beauty and culture in their senseless rampage to destroy. this is a sad example. i don’t know that it’s Bush’s fault (Iraq has a unique history of violence and horrors) but he’s an easy target for the frustration, that’s for sure.
[...] What a sad story this is. It reminds me of the annihilation of the Polish intelligencia under Stalin's orders. ……………………………..Baghdad art scene reels after slaying.Published May 28, 2007.BAGHDAD — In what was left of Baghdad's art community, the murder felt like a priceless parchment ripped apart. Khalil al-Zahawi, the Iraqi artist who was one of the Arab world's most prominent calligraphers, had been shot to death on the steps of his home..Among Iraqis, Sunday's news of al-Zahawi's death last week was another cruel benchmark of loss. The grandfatherly calligrapher had influenced a generation of Middle Eastern artists from Egypt to Pakistan. His dedication to beauty had been an elegant counterpoint to the devastation of war.."It is a big sadness," said a quiet Haidar Rabia, professor of Arabic calligraphy at the Fine Arts Academy at the University of Baghdad. "Just as a father in a house brings blessings and takes care of his children, we calligraphers lost our father.".Al-Zahawi's most famous calligraphy was in the ta'liq method, the formal Arabic script of Iran, Pakistan and India and an art elsewhere. Iraq's calligraphers say it was a style al-Zahawi mastered and perhaps surpassed..In ta'liq, which means "hanging" in Arabic, letters appear to float above the page, anchored by their ends.The method is hundreds of years old, but after mastering it, al-Zahawi sought to alter the classic style. He lengthened the script until the letters seemed like words. He filled backgrounds with more writing, creating landscapes of flowing script. Other contemporary artists seized on the notion, and the ancient writing took a quantum leap into the realm of painting..http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationw…2&cset=truehttp://www.roadstoiraq.com/2007/05/28/sad-…-calligraphers/ [...]
[...] Reaction to his death on the “Road to Iraq” blog which is where the example of his work (at right) is from. Click the link for more, and larger versions. [...]
I came across this webpage looking for good Islamic calligraphy. I adore Arabic calligraphy and architecture , and when I lived in Jerusalem I went a lot to the old city looking for good Arabic calligraphy in mosques and just around the streets. looking at the external walls of the golden-dome mosque felt to me like God is talking in typographic shapes, no less. I am a Jewish-Israeli-Zionist typographer who finds inspiration in other cultures in the middle-east, and respects them a lot. I am sad to hear about Al-Zahawi’s death, but even more sad to read that you relate it to a zionist plot against your culture. my greatest wish is that jews and Muslims finally realize how similar our traditions are and how much Hebrew and Arabic languages and scripts are alike. my thesis for the art academy I studied in was just about that, please check out my website, you’ll see it. Jews and Muslims inspired one another for centuries, from Moorish Spain (until the reconcista, 1492) to the grand and prosperous Baghdad community (until the early 1950’s) I believe that art and typography can bridge over hate, but this post almost changed my mind.