Sabah Naim
“I followed the creations of Sabah Naim since her beginnings. She
continuous to surprise me with her unique and unprecedented world. With
these special angles from where she translates reality and the
particular visual language from where she weaves her dialogues.
In the period of “Newspapers” she transformed this mundane medium to a very rich and bestowed planes.
Naim then transports us on another unique experience when she takes her
camera and walks around the streets to snap photographs from special
angles capturing people’s faces, their simple expressions and their slow
movements in Cairo’s streets. Those city people became the heroes of
her own world making from their bodies and expressions an optical system
mired in it the emotional and visual charges.
Naim did not stop at this but she continued to recreate this real world
by coloring and stitching thus modifying this world to produce a special
and unique relation that intertwines photographic lines with soft
colors and decorative points where they slowly sneaks to the surface of
the artwork.
The artist used these decorations to introduce a different voice and a
secondary language. With time these decorations transformed from just
orderly repetitions to a complete new language able to express in its
own self.
Sabah Naim says that she wants to talk and scream without anyone hearing
her. Do these ordinary flowers became words and their lines transform
to simple letters in the utmost minimalism yet they say a lot.
Naim defines her language in a very limited number of letters but she creates her own complete world of stories.
The specific composition of these works makes us stand confused unsure whether they are not just repetitive decorations.
That the law governing this mass surpasses the repetitive concept and
leads us to a symphonic movement in the midst of this stability.
Naim’s thoughts touches that of the Sufi’s in the repetition of prayers
and chants that rises and falls, transforms and metamorphoses.
Sabah Naim uses all her intelligence in painting and color to makes us
participate in repeating these chants and takes us inside this ranting
world disconnected from the current reality to another reality that we
try to decipher its secrets, the secrets of Sabah Naim.”
Mohamed Abla