The American search engine, “Google”, decided today, Monday, to celebrate the artist Maliha Afnan, who is considered by many to be one of the most important artists of the Middle East in the 20th century.
Unusually for Google, it celebrates Maliha Afnan’s career, although the day does not coincide with her birthday on March 24 or the date of her death on January 6.
يحتفل شعار Google اليوم بذكرى الفنانة #مليحة_أفنان!
تميزت أعمالها بالارتباط الوثيق بذاكرة المكان والأشخاص والاستلهام من الماضي.
الشعار ← https://t.co/rrYlN7I7N0 pic.twitter.com/GIAcA9x3QA
— GoogleArabia (@GoogleArabia) July 5, 2021
Who is Maliha Afnan?
Maliha Afnan is a plastic artist, born in 1935 in the Palestinian city of Haifa to Persian parents, and later moved with them to Beirut, where she attended high school and obtained a Bachelor of Arts from the American University in the Lebanese capital.
In 1956, Afnan moved to Washington, DC, where she obtained a master’s degree in fine arts from the Cucurat School of Art in 1962.
During her studies, Maliha used Arabic and Persian calligraphy in her artwork, to gain the admiration of her teacher, and introduce her to the American calligrapher artist, Mark Toby.
Maliha Afnan lived in Kuwait between 1963 and 1966, then moved to Beirut, where she stayed until the civil war there forced her to leave in 1974, and move to the French capital, Paris, and resided there for 23 years, before moving to the British capital, London in 1997.
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Most notable work of Maliha Afnan
Maliha Afnan has used mixed media in her “written paintings” and works mostly inspired by antique scrolls.
Afnan’s interest in the written language developed when she was a child who used to scribble imaginary text and numbers on the pages, to develop from that a distinctive style of abstract calligraphy.
Through her artwork, which she describes as “written paintings”, Maliha Afnan explores various issues, such as exile and displacement, while recognizing the conflicts in the Middle East and the impact of her cultural heritage.
Maliheh Afnan was born in 1935 in Haifa, Palestine to Persian parents. She married Syrian economist Adnan Mahhouk who worked for the IMF in Washington DC where she graduated from the Corcoran School of Art in 1962. Afnan died in London in 2016.
Photo: Daily Star, London (1961) pic.twitter.com/IJMRAEhobp
— سلطان سعود القاسمي (@SultanAlQassemi) July 11, 2019
The secret behind Google’s celebration of the artist Maliha Afnan today
Google celebrates Maliha Afnan today, Monday, July 5, 2021, because that date coincides with the end of a virtual group exhibition entitled “Consistency of Fragility”, but last year, which displayed one of Afnan’s most famous works in 1979 entitled “Wharton”. The exhibition was launched This is the Institute of Contemporary Art in Milan, Italy.
(1) March 24. On this date in 1935, Maliheh Afnan was born in Haifa. A famous artist and great-granddaughter of Bahá'u'lláh, her mother Ruhangiz, having married an individual who had been declared a Covenant-breaker by 'Abdu'l-Bahá was in turn … https://t.co/8qVEkh67RU #bahai pic.twitter.com/1B5WAdXNb8
— Bahá'í History (@A35821361) March 24, 2021
جوجل تحتفي بالرسامة الفلسطينية #مليحة_أفنان تعتبر أحد أهم فناني الشرق الأوسط في القرن العشرين على الإطلاق pic.twitter.com/0QLCzkieyV
— وكالة رقم الإخبارية (@E4ePhq4u20jN893) July 5, 2021
Exhibitions I participated in
Maliha Afnan’s artworks appeared mainly in France and London, and her first solo exhibition was at the Basel Gallery in Switzerland in 1971, which was organized by the American artist Mark Tobey.
Some of Mleiha’s works are also in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the British Museum in London, the Ritten Art Collection in Germany, the Arab World Institute in Paris, and the Ball Collection in Paris.
Also among the works of Maliha Afnan is the important exhibition that she held in the “Rose Issa” gallery in the British capital, London, which she called “A Memory that Speaks”, and it includes 27 artworks representing different stages of her artistic experience, and reflecting her atmosphere of experimentation through her long visual research in Arabic and Latin calligraphy. and her use of multiple techniques and materials in her abstract paintings.