In Surrealism in Arab republic of egypt: Modernism and the Art and Liberty Group , Sam Bardaouil provides the kickoff comprehensive account of the Arab republic of egypt-based Surrealist collective's artworks, literary texts and critical writings. This is an innovative analysis that invites united states of america to reconsider existing definitions and understandings of the Surrealist movement, balancing detailed historical inquiry with provocative theoretical questioning, writes Johannes Makar.

Surrealism in Egypt: Modernism and the Art and Liberty Group. Sam Bardaouil. I.B. Tauris. 2016.

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In Surrealism in Egypt: Modernism and the Art and Liberty Group, Sam Bardaouil sets out to delineate the trajectory of the Egypt-based Surrealist group 'Art and Freedom' (al-Fann wa al-Hurriya –  Art et Liberté). Neither 'imitators of a European movement' nor 'upholders of an Egyptian identity', Bardaouil examines Art and Freedom's (henceforth AL) contributions outside familiar paradigms and ultimately returns to a central question apropos the historiography of Surrealism globally – how can we reconstruct an culling canon 'without forcing the art history of the marginal to operate in tandem with that of the ascendant eye' (237)? Unfolding over 8 chapters, Bardaouil offers an innovative business relationship of the Surrealist movement in Egypt, with implications for the way we more by and large construe cultural transfers beyond their immediate geo-temporal context.

'Fine art – every bit a permanent spiritual and emotional exchange betwixt all of humanity – tin can no longer be bound by such arbitrary [national] limits' (245). These words, extracted from AL's 1938 Arabic-French manifesto, Yahya al-fann al-munhatt/Vive l'art dégénéré, capture 1 of the group'south central objectives. Amid intensifying fascist sentiment and at a time when artists were implicated in the parading of state power, AL was born of the desire to transcend the limits imposed on artistry by nationalism and cultural patrimony. Relying on Communist Internationalism and Freudian techniques of gratis association to achieve art's liberation (as well as that of society), AL developed a distinct aesthetic aimed at breaking downwards social barriers, ridding art of its conservative esotericism and welcoming viewers into their space of creation. For instance, Bardaouil discusses AL'south use of the exhibition infinite, which it infused with subversive letters and opened upwards to a wider audience to produce a 'transfer of agency' to the exhibition visitor.

Throughout the book, Bardaouil is keen to highlight the Surrealist grouping'southward internationalist orientation and carefully documents the artists' various backgrounds. Brought together by conditions of war and humanitarian crisis, AL encompassed an amalgam of Egyptians and non-Egyptians who worked closely together in a 'process of stimulation and appropriation' (105). Indeed, AL conceived of a sphere of creativity that dismissed not just national divergence, but also minimised the gap between literary and pictorial modes of artistic expression. To cite a prominent instance, AL'due south co-founder Georges Henein'south war poesy fuelled the imagination of swain grouping members Kamel el-Telmisany, Ramses Younane and Inji Efflatoun. In interpreting Henein'south work visually – through their paintings, novels and other creative works – they added shades and tones to Henein's writings, thus collectively producing a style that was imbued with poetic imagery and distinctly dialogical.

Besides shedding lite on the grouping's activities, Bardaouil charts AL's connections to the international network of Surrealists. The author calls attention to their shared anti-fascism and dissatisfaction regarding the conservative notion of 'art for art sake', but emphasises that AL did not partake in the Surrealist project without altering its texture. Through a meticulous analysis of previously unpublished correspondence, Bardaouil shows how AL, in contrast to previous claims (see, for case, Don LaCoss), grew out of specific local concerns, leading them to disagree on urgent theoretical matters with movements including the International Federation of Contained Revolutionary Art (F.I.A.R.I.). Every bit compelling is Bardaouil's assessment of the notions of 'subjective realism' (Rames Younane) and 'free art' (Kamil al-Telmisany), which emerge as role of the group'south efforts at renegotiating Surrealism'southward conceptual parameters equally well as, crucially, reinvigorating its call for revolution. For AL, as Bardaouil puts it:

the truthful artist is one who creates an fine art that is kickoff and terminal consumed past Humanity (with a capital H) non the individual, Existence (with a capital E) not citizenship, and the Universe (with a capital U) not the nation (138).

Bardaouil consequently encourages us to reconsider the very definition of Surrealism: 'to write a history of the Fine art and Liberty Grouping is to imagine afresh the definition, expression, and the canon of Surrealism' (236). Rather than the European movement information technology is often portrayed to exist, Surrealism emerges as a crowd of international artists who, while occupying varying and evolving ideological positions, partnered in a shared struggle to bring nearly revolutionary change. For AL, this culminated in efforts aimed at surmounting a theoretical contradiction between Hegelianism and Marxism à propos the human relationship between abstract thought and empirical affair, leading the art collective to diverge from other Surrealist groups, notably the Paris-based Bretonian circle. This development, among others, prompts Bardaouil to call for a more than nuanced agreement of Surrealism – one that sets the move free from a priori uncontested labels and contributes to:

an inclusive vision of art history where the particularities of the peripheral are no longer seen as dichotomous with the authority of the fundamental, and perhaps even to an extent where such oppositions are no longer visible (243).

For this reason, the author himself is cautious neither to implicate AL in gimmicky polemics within the Saidan and postcolonial paradigm nor depict its legacy as a passage in Arab fine art history. Drawing on Erwin Panofsky's notion of aesthetic re-creation, he argues that contemporary debates would polarise its legacy and add salience to an identity politics that the group never invited.

While Surrealism in Egypt enthrals, questions linger. At times, AL's ideological position appears marred by inconsistencies, which Bardaouil leaves undiscussed. For one, the place of 'the national' remains ambiguous within AL'south soapbox. Despite the group'southward adamant rejection of the 'alignment of fine art with nationality', information technology also reverted to a political vocabulary that re-inscribed (rather than overhauled) a national imaginary. Thus, when Georges Henein clarifies the grouping's internationalism in 1940 by arguing 'Art has no homeland, no territory. Chirico is non more Italian than Delvaux is Belgian, Diego Rivera is Mexican, Tanguy is French, Max Ernst is German or Telmisany is Egyptian' (267), his view of the globe seems an inversion of the prevailing one ­­­­– i that corroborates the nation-state as a unit of analysis in a call for a universal albeit territorially-indexed humanism, not a revolutionised worldview that transcends geographical frontiers and renders the nation-land illusory. Perhaps the grouping'due south ambivalence besides helps explicate why its revolutionary ambitions ultimately dissolved in the face of new attempts to unite fine art and nationality circa 1945. Again, however, Bardouil does non take upwards this critical point.

Nonetheless, there should no doubt about the value of Surrealism in Egypt. The book is dedicated to unearthing the history of AL on its own accord, ­and it achieves this task with convincing clarity. Bardaouil advisedly balances his historical inquiry with provocative theoretical questions that volition garner the involvement of scholars of modern art in Arab republic of egypt and art theorists alike. Another testimony to the book'due south resourcefulness are the images and excerpts of paintings, archival documents, printed materials and photographs, which add together important visual impressions to this rich text. Information technology is likewise worth mentioning that the volume'southward publication trails ii exhibitions ­putting on display AL's work – i co-curated by Bardaouil himself touring Paris, Madrid, Dusseldorf and Liverpool; the other organised by the Emirates-based Sharjah Art Foundation. Presenting two differing views, with the onetime echoing the book'southward narrative and the latter celebrating AL's piece of work as an example of 'Egyptian Surrealism' (a notion Bardaouil defies), this book is a potent reminder that a historical narration of the Art and Liberty grouping is best approached equally an open-ended story: far from settled and resisting fixity, it will proceed to provoke questions near an art history still in the making.

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