Ceramics

Contemporary ceramic art in Egypt and its various forms are motivated by man's need of certain vessels to hold food and drink - which accompanied the discovery of the technique of burning clay. This has imposed the role of container upon clay artefacts. The word pottery has come to be used for all types of vessels, however different they may be and from whatever period. Potters the world over have tried to create and improve the designs of these vessels no matter what their functions, or to what culture, civilisation or heritage they belong, no matter what materials are locally available or what method is used to form them.

Through the ages potters have sought to escape from function, which dominated the art for so long. This escape was embodied in various forms; vessels would take the form of birds, animals, plants, flowers and sometimes human beings. Pottery is still being used for containers, but now it may also have a purely decorative function.

A new age and a new revelation of ceramic art began at the beginning of the 20th century with the development of the Formalis theory and the Alba house school, which called for freedom of form and the need to experiment with the properties of the material to extract its hidden essence. They went beyond the limits of the vessel as a utensil to explore new horizons of form, such as the effect of hollow shapes, and developed those techniques that give pottery and ceramics the beauty, colour and texture that have distinguished them from sculpture through the ages.

When the potter creates an artefact - even though it may be in the form of a vessel - he still has the freedom to experiment. Several world-famous artists worked with ceramics - Picasso, Miro, Matisse and others. Thus pottery entered into the realm or art.

The new concepts that suddenly developed in the art of pottery followed the rebellion against both the old form and the means of its execution. The inventive ceramist refused to be held captive by the potter's wheel alone, the sign of his trade in the past. Through studying old freehand techniques, he produced new work without imitating the old. Further fruits of this exploration were many new techniques used to sculpt a variety of hollow porcelain shapes. In discovering the characteristics of clay, and its potential for new forms, it was found that burning it at a high temperature added a certain thermal roughness, increased the work's artistic value, and added new decorative touches.

The contemporary Egyptian pottery movement began in the early 20th century with the establishment of art schools and the influence of foreign teachers, who themselves studied Islamic ceramics, especially of the Fatimid era. The period was characterised by ceramic work of a particularly high quality that attracted foreigners and orientalists who then encouraged the artists to emulate these creations. The most famous is Soumaga, the owner of a pottery factory, who impressed artists with his collection inspired by the Fatimid Islamic arts.

Hoda Sharaawi sent artist Mahmoud Saber to France to study pottery techniques at the Syphir factory, which he then brought back and applied at her workshop at Rod Al-Farag.

A group of artists concerned with reviving the heritage of Islam entered the artistic arena. The most famous of these are Mahmoud Saber and Mohammed Nasser from the Hoda workshop. It is worth mentioning that leading role artist Said Al-Sadr has played a role both in Egyptian art in general, and in particular in the contemporary ceramics movement. The cultural and artistic renaissance stemming from the expression of the Egyptian consciousness in the revolution of 1919, which saw Mahmoud Mokhtar in France sculpting his statue Nahdat Misr, winner of the first prize on the Paris Salon of 1920, really did see an awakening on the artistic front. Youssef Kamel and his colleague Ragheb Aiad gave priority to pioneering photography after their return from Italy at the end of the '20s; meanwhile Said Al-Sadr followed them, returning home from London in 1931 with his thesis on ceramic art.

While Nahdat Misr was the first statue to come from Egypt since the days of the Pharaohs, Al-Sadr's creative pottery was the first ceramic art for over three centuries. Thus Mokhtar's statues, Youssef Kamel and his colleagues 'portraits, and Said alSadr's ceramic works revived formal art which helped, alongside the artistic renaissance taking place in the fields of poetry, literature, theatre and music, to weave the fabric of the new Egyptian civilisation.

A collection of recent works from contemporary Egyptian pottery show their different styles.

First, a group that sees the dependence on the constant connection between colour and shape as a focus for innovation. Its potters explore the subtle relationship between colour and shape. Each artist has his own distinctive style of colouring. For example, the metallic brilliance of Said Al-Sadr depends on an increased use of oxides which, when many are combined to form a single glaze, give a unique colouring effect. Mohie Al-Din, on the other hand, uses metallic lustre in a rather different way.

He uses shadow and reflection to give his works an expressive sense that goes far beyond ordinary ceramic decoration. The potter Nabil Darwish uses dark matte glaze to balance the brilliance of the metallic colours - the colours over the dark matte background give his works a unique appeal. These potters are united by a use of metallic lustre that has its roots in tradition ancient Egyptian, Coptic, Islamic and others although each has his own distinctive way of using the technique.

A group of ceramics can be seen to belong to the Islamic tradition, for example, from the distinctive relationship between shape, details of form, colouring methods, textural effects, and decorative details. All potters are different: some tend to use dark or matte colours, or combine different methods. Others use traditional plant and calligraphic motifs by painting oxide directly onto glaze, such as the artist Said Al-Sadr, who covers his work with animal and botanical elements drawn from Islamic art. Meanwhile, Mohie AL Din Hussein is concerned with the Islamic tradition in a different way, taking Arabic letters, changing them and incorporating them into his own idea.

Nabil Darwish, the ceramic artist, has learned much from the relationship of colours in Islamic art and its methods of distributing those colours over the ceramic surface. On the other hand, the artist Mohammed Mandour draws his inspiration from the rich designs on lumiure, which is in itself closely allied with the art of ceramics in the classical Egyptian and Islamic traditions.

Samir Al-Guendy has also taken Islamic heritage as a source of inspiration for works that are characterised by a freedom from restraint and a lack of affectation.

The second group focuses on the development of form and has a constant output of innovative creations. Sometimes this has the expressive capacity of sculpture; such as in the work of Saleh Reda, rooted in popular culture, and that of the artist Mervat AlSoueify. Other works have forms drawn from plants, stones and bones, such as those of Abdel Ghani Al-Shall. These works all stem from the art of the people.

The potter Saleh Reda found inspiration in the work of an everyday potter who made puppets; he incorporated the ideas into his works, giving them a sculptured feeling unique among contemporary Egyptian pottery. Mervat AlSoueify was also inspired by proletarian art, however her technique is characterised by freedom from vessel function whilst still maintaining those forms dictated by methods of fabrication. The work is a collection of children, their games, their puppets and their environment as well. It expresses the essence of childhood through its combined influences of Egyptian popular art and mythology, which let it reflect the more magical and surrealistic quality of human nature.

The Egyptian contemporary movement of formal art has brought together diverse collections of work which express the thoughts and feelings of contemporary international thought. We have seen Egyptian artists experiment with the materials and techniques of ceramic art. Mohammed Taha Hussein was the leader of that modern way of thinking and the first to call on 20th century ideas, whether in practical experimentation or in artistic and decorative theory.
About his first experiments he says: "In Germany in 1959 I started trying to move away from the usual tradition of pottery and tried to achieve a harmony between the form within - the ceramic void - and appearance, through mixing glazes with clay, which bound up the colour much more closely with the clay than with other techniques. The clay glazes were much more alive than the glassy surface glazes, and I found a form for them".

Studying nature helped him to produce pure textured finishes without loud, shiny colours. He found that purity of form and basic colour, and originality were far more important than colours and dark polishes simply laid onto the surface. This experiment expanded the repertoire of dark glazes, which went on to become widely used in this way afterwards.