02 Paintings, PORTRAIT OF A LADY, with Footnotes. #71

Khaled Hourani

Bayan, (2016 Martyr), 2019

Acrylic on canvas

205 × 155 in, 520.7 × 393.7 cm

Private collection

A martyr is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, refusing to renounce, or refusing to advocate a belief or cause as demanded by an external party. This refusal to comply with the presented demands results in the punishment or execution of the martyr by the oppressor. Originally applied only to those who suffered for their religious beliefs, the term has come to be used in connection with people killed for a political cause.


Most martyrs are considered holy or are respected by their followers, becoming symbols of exceptional leadership and heroism in the face of difficult circumstances. Martyrs play significant roles in religions. Similarly, martyrs have had notable effects in secular life, including such figures as Socrates, among other political and cultural examples. More on martyrs

Bayan Ayman Al-Esseili - 16-year-old female Palestinian accused of stabbing an Israeli soldier in Hebron, near the Cave of the Patriarchs on Oct. 17, 2015. The soldier shot and killed Al-Esseili.

Khaled Hourani, Palestinian, b. 1965•

Leena, (1976 Martyr), 2019

Acrylic on canvas

80 7/10 × 61 in, 205 × 155 cm

Private collection

On May 15, 1976, a 17-year-old Lina was shot and killed by an IDF soldier while walking home from school in Nablus. According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Israeli authorities stated that a stray bullet hit Lina when a soldier’s rifle went off accidentally. 

Khaled Hourani, Born in Hebron, Palestine, in 1965. Khaled Hourani lives and works in Ramallah. He was Artistic Director (2007-2010) and Director (2010-2013) of the International Academy of Art Palestine, of which he is also one of the co-founders. He previously worked as the General Director of the Fine Arts Department of the Palestinian Ministry of Culture (2004-2006). Hourani has participated in many local and international exhibitions, most recently in a retrospective at Darat Al Funun in Amman , Jordan (2017).

In 2014, his first retrospective exhibition took place at the CCA in Glasgow and Gallery One in Ramallah. He exhibited works at the Times Museum in Guangzhou, China and in the 2nd CAFA Biennale of the CAFA Museum in Beijing. He also participated in dOCUMENTA (13) in Kassel, and KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin. Moreover, Hourani was also one of the artists of the Sharjah Biennial in 2011. Hourani was the initiator of the 2011 Picasso in Palestine project. He has curated and organized several exhibitions, is an art critic and an active member and founder of a number of cultural and art institutions. Recently, he was the recipient of the Leonore Annenberg Prize, Creative Time for Art and Social Change in New York City.

Hourani has been working for over a year on a book project, which is itself based on a novel about a painting titled Jamal Al Mahamel by Palestinian artist Suleiman Mansour. This artwork was sold to  the former Libyan president Muammar al Gaddafi in the 1970s. Through this project, Hourani seeks to figure out what happened to the painting and the circumstances of its disappearance after the 2011 political upheavals in Libya. He also raises the question of the perception of art both in Palestine and Libya. More on Khaled Hourani

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01 Painting, PORTRAIT OF A LADY, with Footnotes. #68

Jean Jansem, (French, 1920- 2013) 

Ballerina 

Oil on canvas 

10 1/2 x 14 inches.

Private collection

A ballet dancer (ballerina) is a person who practices the art of classical ballet. Both females and males can practice ballet; however, dancers have a strict hierarchy and strict gender roles. They rely on years of extensive training and proper technique to become a part of professional companies. Ballet dancers are at a high risk of injury due to the demanding technique of ballet

Ballet dancers begin their classes at the barre, a wooden beam that runs along the walls of the ballet studio. Dancers use the barre to support themselves during exercises. Barre work is designed to warm up the body and stretch muscles to prepare for center work, where they execute exercises without the barre. More on Ballerina 

Hovhannes "Jean" Semerdjian (9 March 1920 – 27 August 2013), also known as Jean Jansem, was a French-Armenian painter. Jansem's artworks are internationally known, and are part of museum collections throughout France, Japan and the United States. A Foreign member of the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia (2002).

He was awarded by the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1953 and by the Knight of the French Legion of Honour in 2003. The President of Armenia awarded Jansem a Medal of Honor for his “reinforcement of Armenian-French cultural ties.”

Semerdjian was born in 1920 in Bursa, Turkey. In 1922, his family fled to Greece. He spent his childhood in Thessaloniki. They arrived to Issy-les-Moulineaux suburb of Paris, France in 1931 when he was 11 and that is when he began to paint. The first professional schools for Jansem became free academies of Montparnasse (1934-1936). He studied in the Ecole des Arts Decoratifs. Jansem also studied at the Sabatie studio for a year. Early paintings by Jansem were mainly to national issues. He had individual exhibitions in Paris, New York, Chicago, London, Tokyo, Rome, Brussels, Lausanne, Beirut etc. Hovhannes Semerdjian was elected the President of the Young Artists' Saloon in 1956.

He won the Comparison prize in Mexico in 1958. In Japan, two museums were built to honor Jansem′s work, located in Tokyo Ginza and Nagano Prefecture Azumino. In 1973 he visited Armenia for the first time. In 2001, 34 of his paintings were given to the Armenian Genocide Museum. More on Jean Jansem

Please visit my other blogs: Art Collector, Mythology, Marine Art, Portrait of a Lady, The Orientalist, Art of the Nude and The Canals of Venice, And visit my Boards on Pinterest

Images are copyright of their respective owners, assignees or others. Some Images may be subject to copyright

I don't own any of these images - credit is always given when due unless it is unknown to me. if I post your images without your permission, please tell me.

I do not sell art, art prints, framed posters or reproductions. Ads are shown only to compensate the hosting expenses.

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Thank you for visiting my blog and also for liking its posts and pages.

01 Painting, PORTRAIT OF A LADY, with Footnotes. #69

Thuraya Al-Baqsami, B. 1952, KUWAITI

ALSAGANEYAT/ PRISONERS, c. 1986

Acrylic on canvas

71 by 54cm.; 28 by 21 1/4 in.
Private collection

Thuraya Al-Baqsami (born 1952) is a Kuwaiti artist and writer. She was one of the first active female artists in the Gulf region, where she began publishing her short stories and exhibiting her art works as early as her teenage years in the mid-1960s. She studied fine arts in Cairo, then at the Surikov institute in Moscow where she received her Master's degree in illustration. She later moved on to living in several countries in Africa until she settled back in her native Kuwait in the early 1980s. 

In 1990-91 she lived through the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, which immensely affected her creative output as a collective traumatic experience for her and her family. She was awarded the state prize for her book "Cellar Candles" (1993) in which she renders her ordeals during the war into poetic fiction. The book has since been translated in more than 10 languages.

Thuraya has held 60 solo exhibitions world wide, and participated in over 250 collective exhibitions spanning her long career.  She has won numerous awards for both her art and her writing. Her works are in the collections of the British Museum, UNESCO, the Museum of Human Rights Geneva, and the Kuwait National Museum among others. More Thuraya Al-Baqsami 

Please visit my other blogs: Art Collector, Mythology, Marine Art, Portrait of a Lady, The Orientalist, Art of the Nude and The Canals of Venice, And visit my Boards on Pinterest

Images are copyright of their respective owners, assignees or others. Some Images may be subject to copyright

I don't own any of these images - credit is always given when due unless it is unknown to me. if I post your images without your permission, please tell me.

I do not sell art, art prints, framed posters or reproductions. Ads are shown only to compensate the hosting expenses.

If you enjoyed this post, please share with friends and family.

Thank you for visiting my blog and also for liking its posts and pages.