Although I haven’t physically seen Mohamed Banawy’s mosaic, “The Valley”, I remember being so excited when I first came across it online. Banawy is an Egyptian artist, and “The Valley” was part of the 2013 Venice Biennale. It’s a large mosaic (150cm x 500cm) that shows a topographical map of an abstract landscape.
I love “The Valley” for its experimental approach to making mosaics - it’s as if Banawy has developed his own mosaic language! This language starts with the clay tesserae that brings a primordial feel to the work. Each piece of tessera, or “mud brick” as Banawy puts it, is hand-formed and individually treated to reveal its own character. The shapes themselves are pretty simple and remind me of those that children make with play dough. A lot of emphasis is given to texture and relief. Some pieces are stacked on top of each other; some are decorated with intricate patterning, and others are embedded with colourful fragments of glass. The coming together of all of these different textures and shapes creates a visual feast so we’re encouraged to stop and look into the landscape rather than simply gazing over it.
As well as showing new techniques, I love how “The Valley” reflects the artist’s cultural background. Banawy comes from the northern “Al Sharqia” region of Egypt, just west of the Nile delta, and he sources his clay from an area close to his hometown. The use of local materials imbues the work with a distinctive look, and through this we can feel (and almost taste) the dry heat of the Egyptian desert. This use of local materials in “The Valley” inspires me to introduce more of the “local” into my mosaics.
If you would like to know more about Banawy and “The Valley”, there are some excellent articles on the Mosaic Art Now site.
http://www.mosaicartnow.com/2013/06/mosaic-at-the-2013-venice-biennale-part_1-mohamed-banawy/
http://www.mosaicartnow.com/2012/10/mosaico-oggi-interview-with-mohamed-banawy/
(Written for MAANZ e-mag publication April 2016)
If you would like to know more about Banawy and “The Valley”, there are some excellent articles on the Mosaic Art Now site.
http://www.mosaicartnow.com/2013/06/mosaic-at-the-2013-venice-biennale-part_1-mohamed-banawy/
http://www.mosaicartnow.com/2012/10/mosaico-oggi-interview-with-mohamed-banawy/
(Written for MAANZ e-mag publication April 2016)