Mahmoud Hammad

Estate of the Artist
Private Collection, Beirut (acquired directly from the above by the present owner in 2011) 

Born in Damascus and educated at the Academia Di Belle Arti in Rome, Mahmoud Hammad developed a practice that spans across multiples medium such as painting, printmaking, engravings and sculpture. Founder of the Damascus Group of Abstract Art and Dean of the Fine Art Faculty of Damascus, the artist is recognized as one of the most influential artist from his time and for the next generation of Syrian and Arab artists. 

Working alongside Nassir Chaura and Elias Zayat to create the Damascus Abstract Group, he developed his iconic abstract genre beginning in the 1960s until his death in the late-1980s. Throughout constant exploration of the various letter forms, the artist approached the surface of his works in a modern and innovative away, he instilled rhythm and gravity into his paintings. At the beginning of his abstract period, the words were decipherable, but with time, they blended into abstraction and became bolder with a strong architectural aspect to them, where the emotions and feelings took over the core identity of the words of letters. Hammad created contemporary paintings in which the Arabic letter played the most important role and through the letter itself, his playful and joyful compositions revealed a new reality.

Dad (Letter D), a colourful abstract composition from 1968 reveals the early stage of the artist's Abstract exploration. Beyond the geometric simplification of forms and colours, the work reflects the artist's Western inspirations and his passion for the Arab script. Like letters combined to form a entangled blocks, colour splashes of blue, grey and white hues come together to create a balanced and rhythmic composition.

While his paintings were gaining exposure regionally and internationally, Hammad also focused on printmaking, designing official stamps and engraving medals with social and nationalistic themes and was soon commissioned the medal for the Republican Golden Hero, a unique casted medal that was gifted to the President Hafez al Assaad in 1974. As a sculptor, Hammad was also commissioned to produce a symbolical statue for the Martyr's graveyards in Nejha as well as the Statue of the Unknown Soldier that was erected in the Kassyoun Mountains.