4 to. 2 volumes + intro text in cardboard slip case, 12pp, introduction, Arabic and English text written by Dia Azzawi/ Vol. 1: 62 pp original facsimile copy of Chinese ink and wartercolour drawings done by Dia Al Azzawi in 1988-1989/ Vol.2: 70 pp, original facsimile copy of an ink and acrylic sketch book done by Ismail Fattah in 1988; limited and numbered edition of 500 copies of which this one is number 494, sponsored by the Qatar Art Center, published by Kutub ltd, Beirut, 2014.

Synopsis

This work is a homage by two students Ismail Fattah and Dia’ Azzawi to their teacher the leading Iraqi artist Jawad Saleem (1919-1961). Both Fattah and Azzawi were the founders with other Iraqi artists in the 1960s of the ” One Dimension Group”. “Ismail Fattah’s “Salute to Jawad Saleem 1988”, was a new attempt completely different from his past attempts which was worked with his general expertise in art without constraints that might prevent him from filling sheets. The sheets interlocked within Jawad’s characters and repetitions mingling and competing with Ismail’s various women and desires. From the first page Ismail took us in a special and unique style and perusal to some of Jawad’s works and sketches which were published in some books which he himself issued in the journal “Oil Workers” which used to be issued by the Iraqi Petroleum Company. In his personal portrayal of details of the face and body of the female which he was keen to uncover (discover) from various and varied perspectives, he exerted an effort to twin that with the same similar portrayal by Jawad. In all these sheets he remained, with all his sketching and abbreviations, within a distance that does not diminish his memory which stored the works of his teacher which he accomplished with amazing (startling) freedom and transparency. After this folder he finished drawing the other two folders 3 in styles, signs and formations which remained with him until his death. He named one of these two folders “The Family Folder” (1994-1995) because Ismail filled the pages of that folder with pictures of characters of his second wife’s family who were portrayed in a traditional way and with a great deal of the abandonment of the anonymous observer. But this impression was quick to dissipate when his creative freedom showed itself in the other pages, as if atoning for his mistakes which were the source of ephemeral happiness and of pain with all its concomitant internal (spiritual) ruptures”. (From the Booklet).