Syrian Idealist
While nothing changes history more than warfare, it is ultimately the most destructive action humans can bring upon each other. Responding to the war-torn homeland he was born in, Syrian artist Tammam Azzam created his Storeys series in the mid-2010s. Azzam is a product of the violence that wrecked his homeland and therefore, through his art, and most vividly through the Storeys series, Azzam brings the outside world into his homeland. The individual paintings are unnamed, but each of them conveys a sense of reality, sadness, and despair and moves his story of the Storeysalong.
A series of acrylic paintings on canvas, Storeys is a large-scale abstract project based on photographs taken of destroyed Syrian cities. These paintings are“composed in a monochrome palette that shows the magnitude of the devastation of Syria.” According to Azzam, “The emptiness made me feel so much fear; I want to talk about that.” Azzam uses his superior skill to create large masterpieces that tell the terrible story of destruction that has wrecked his home.
The Storeys series are modern art with a touch of cubism style of art. The cubist tendencies are likely not intentional but inevitable when dealing with buildings, walls, floors, and streets as the subject.
Painted on acrylic, the realism portrayed is almost uncanny. He uses photographs as inspiration and then creates the paintings. Like the photographs, his paintings are devoid of life. By using value and lines, he creates great representative depth in his artwork. These paintings are roughly 6.5 by 8 feet in size, so they are very large and this size helps to ensure their life-like status. While clearly his work is only a painting inspired by a photograph, the resemblance to reality is uncanny.
For this project, Azzam studied multiple photographs from several Syrian cities, including the highly contentious Douma and Aleppo. With them, he wanted to “take this challenge, to create or rebuild destruction.” Azzam does well to create a sense of being a part of his painting. They make the viewer ponder just what, exactly, is happening in Syria.
Perhaps wondering what will become of it and what is left for people there. According to Kumail Almusaly, “The destruction devours everything; Azzam is seeking to save the remaining hope that makes him a creator of civilization that utilizes devastation as a point to start creativity.” Through his painting Azzam is attempting to ensure the global community ignores, nor forgets the destruction in his homeland while simultaneously offering some semblance of hope to those displaced.
This artwork is especially significant as Azzam himself fled Syria to Dubai in 2011. Azzam fled just after the beginning of an insurgency that grew into an enormous and convoluted war that continues to push millions of refugees out of his country.
His series was on display in Dubai at the Ayyam Gallery in 2015. This display was entitled “The Road”, and Azzam used this to invoke the idea of a new journey to a new home. Of course, he does not believe that art alone can save the country but rather that it can help build a new nation in the future whenever it is safe to do so. He is producing art from his new studio next to the Ayyam Gallery but yeans to go home.
The Storeys series will go a long way toward capturing the empty feelings that many Syrians have when thinking of their war-torn country, but as Azzam hopes, the idea of rebuilding will give them something to look forward to.
