اأعمـال الفـنـيـة ע ב ו ד ו ת
73
74
وجه شخي،1958 ،
زيت عى كرتون
פרופיל אישי,1958 ,
שמן על קרטון
Personal Proile, 1958,
oil on cardboard
40/30
«أبو خميس»،1955 ،
حر عى ورق
אבו ח’מיס,1955 ,
דיו על נייר
,Abu Hamis, 1955
ink on paper
30/20
ي سوق عكا،1958 ،
حر عى ورق
בשוק עכו1958 ,
דיו על נייר
Acre Market, 1958,
ink on paper
30/20
امشوهون،1961 ،
غاف كتاب للكاتب توفيق
فياض -حر ملوّن
מעוותים,1961 ,
שער ספר של תאופיק
פיאד -דיו צבעוני
Deformed, 1961,
Cover illustration for
Tawik Fayyad’s book,
colored inks
30/20
صياد،1968 ،
طباعة زينك
דייג,1968 ,
הדפס זינק
Fisherman, 1968,
zinc etching
40/30
كنيسة ي وادي الصليب،
،1958حر ملوّن عى
ورق
כנסייה בואדי א-סאליב,
,1958דיו צבעוני על
נייר
A Church in Wadi
Salib, 1958, colored
inks on paper
30/20
أبي،1958 ،
رصاص عى ورق
אבי,1958 ,
עיפרון על נייר
My Father, 1958,
pencil on paper
30/20
مخلفات الحرب،1962 ،
زيت عى قماش
עקבות המלחמה,1962 ,
שמן על בד
Traces of War, 1962,
oil on canvas
50/40
ي الطريق إى النبع،1966 ،
حر عى ورق
בדרך למעיין,1966 ,
דיו על נייר
On the Way to the
Well, 1966,
ink on paper
50/43
اجئون ي العراء،1968 ،
طباعة خشبية عى ورق
פליטים במרחב,1968 ,
הדפס עץ על נייר
Refugees in an
Expanse, 1968,
woodcut print on
paper
60/50
اأرض،1968 ،
حر عى ورق
אדמה,1968 ,
דיו על נייר
Land, 1968,
ink on paper
51/42
امرأة من مخيم الشاطئ،
،1968حر عى ورق
אישה ממחנה פליטים
א-שאטיא’ ,1968
דיו על נייר
A Woman from the
al-Shati Refugee
Camp, 1968,
ink on paper
60/50
مناخ خمسيني ي الجليل،
،1965جواش عى ورق
נוף גלילי,1965 ,
גואש על נייר
Galilee Landscape,
1965,
Goash on Paper
70/50
أم وطفلها،1968 ،
حر عى ورق
אם ובנה,1968 ,
דיו על נייר
Mother and Son,
1968,
ink on paper
55/46
اجئون،1968 ،
فحم عى ورق
פליטים,1968 ,
פחם על נייר
Refugees, 1968,
charcoal on paper
62/50
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
«جوديت» ي لباس عربي،
،1970
حفر عى خشب ،طباعة
”ג’ודית” בלבוש ערבי,
,1970תחריט עץ
Judit in Arab Dress,
1970, woodcut
65/45
من سداسية العدوان
(،1969 ،)1967
حفر عى خشب
משישיית המתקפה
(,1969 ,)1967
תחריט עץ
From The Six-Day
War Sextet, 1969,
woodcut
60/40
وجه امرأة،1969 ،
طباعة خشبية عى ورق
פני אישה,1969 ,
הדפס עץ על נייר
Woman’s Face, 1969,
woodcut print on
paper
65/45
نوم ي العراء،1969 ،
حر عى ورق
שינה ללא קורת גג,
,1969דיו על נייר
Sleeping Under the
Sky, 1969,
ink on paper
45/35
إمرأتان ي العراء،1969 ،
حر عى ورق
שתי נשים ללא קורת
גג,1969 ,
דיו על נייר
Two Women Under
the Sky, 1969,
ink on paper
45/35
أم وطفان،1969 ،
زيت عى قماش
אם וילדים,1969 ,
שמן על בד
Mother and
Children, 1969,
oil on canvas
71/45
شخوص وطائرة،1975 ،
طباشر ومواد مختلطة
דמויות ומטוס,1975 ,
גיר וטכניקות מעורבות
Figures and
Aircraft,1975, chalk
and mixed techniques
100/70
رجال ي الشمس،1978 ،
مواد مختلطة عى ورق
גברים תחת השמש,
,1978
טכניקה מעורבת על נייר
Men in the Sun,1978,
mixed techniques on
paper
80/70
بأم عيني،1978 ،
لوحة غاف لكتاب امحامية
فليسيا انجر .حر عى ورق
במו עיניי ,1978 ,שער
ספרה של עו”ד פליסיה
לנגר ,דיו על נייר
Cover illustration
for With My Own
Eyes, 1978, by Felicia
Langer, ink on paper
38/25
بيت للهدم ي وادي الصليب،
،1979
مواد مختلطة
בית מיועד להריסה
בואדי א-סאליב,1979 ,
טכניקה מעורבת
House Destined for
Demolition in Wadi
Salib, 1979,
mixed techniques
60/50
تكوين،1979 ،
طباعة مرة واحدة
קומפוזיציה,1979 ,
הדפס חד-פעמי
Composition, 1979,
one-time print
60/45
صمت البحر،1969 ،
طباعة عى خشب
שתיקת הים,1969 ,
הדפס עץ
Silence of the Sea,
1979,
woodcut print
90/70
حرب أكتوبر (،)1973
،1973حر عى ورق
מלחמת אוקטובר
(,1973 ,)1973
דיו על נייר
The October War,
1973,
ink on paper
70/50
التضامن،1975 ،
حر عى ورق
סולידאריות,1975 ,
דיו על נייר
Solidarity, 1975, ink
on paper
42/37
تخطيط لنصب تذكاري،
،1970حر عى ورق
רישום לאנדרטה,1970 ,
דיו על נייר
Sketch for a
Monument, 1970,
ink on paper
70/50
تخطيط لنصب تذكاري،
،1970
حر عى ورق
רישום לאנדרטה,1970 ,
דיו על נייר
Sketch for a
Monument, 1970,
ink on paper
70/50
درب اآام،1978 ،
تخطيط لقصيدة الكاتب
اأماني برتولد بريخت -حر
عى ورق
דרך הייסורים,1978 ,
רישום לשירו של
המשורר הגרמני ברטולד
בריכת
Via Dolorosa, 1978,
illustration for a poem
by Bertolt Brecht
40/30
دمي عى كفي،1979 ،
غاف كتاب للشاعر سميح
الصباغ ،حر عى ورق
דמי על כף ידי,1979 ,
שער ספר של המשורר
סמיח סבאג’ ,דיו על נייר
My Blood on My
,Hand, 1979
cover illustration for
the book by poet
Samih Sabah, ink on
paper
35/25
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
«أتيا» عى خلفية بيوت ي
الوادي،1985 ،
زيت عى قماش
“אתילה” על רקע בתים
בואדי,1985 ,
שמן על בד
Attila Against the
Background of
Houses in the Wadi,
1985,
oil on canvas
125/124
حطام زورق وسمكتان عى
جريدة،1985 ،
زيت عى قماش
שברי סירה ושני דגים
על עיתון,1985 ,
שמן על בד
Splinters of a Boat
and Two Fish on
Newspaper, 1985, oil
on canvas
130/96
والدي عى خلفية التهجر من
حيفا ( 22نيسان ،)1948
،1988
أكريليك عى مازونيت
אבא על רקע העקירה
מחיפה ( 22באפריל
,1988 ,)1948
אקריליק על מזוניט
Father Against the
Background of the
Expulsion from
Haifa, 1988,
acrylic on masonite
126/97
فتى عى سطوح بيوت ي
وادي النسناس،1986 ،
مواد مختلطة عى كرتون
נער על גגות ואדי
ניסנאס,1986 ,
טכניקה מעורבת על
קרטון
Boy on the Roofs of
Wadi Nisnas, 1986,
mixed techniques on
cardboard
123/104
بيوت ي وادي النسناس،
،1988
زيت عى قماش
בתים בואדי ניסנאס,
,1988
שמן על בד
Houses in Wadi
Nisnas, 1988,
oil on canvas
150/90
العدوان عى لبنان،1982 ،
حر عى ورق
מתקפה על לבנון,1982 ,
דיו על נייר
Attack on Lebanon,
1982,
ink on paper
55/46
مصيدة ي خبيزه من كتاب
«وما نسينا»،1982 ،
حر عى ورق
מלכודת בח’וביזה
מהספר “ומא נאסינא”,
,1982
דיו על נייר
Trap in Khobbeizeh,
from Wa Ma Nasina,
1982,
ink on paper
36/27
تخطيط لقصة،1981 ،...
حر عى ورق
איור לספר,1981 ,
דיו על נייר
Book Illustration,
1981,
ink on paper
40/30
متظاهرة،1985 ،
فحم عى ورق
מפגינה,1985 ,
פחם על נייר
Woman
Demonstrator, 1985,
charcoal on paper
100/70
قناع،1987 ،
قماش وألوان مائية عى
كرتون
מסכה,1987 ,
בד וצבעי מים על קרטון
Mask, 1987,
canvas and
watercolors on
cardboard
70/50
امرأة وطفل من وادي
روشميا،1982 ،
حر عى ورق
אם ובנה מואדי
רושמייא,1982 ,
דיו על נייר
Mother and Son from
Wadi Rushmiyya,
1982, ink on paper
63/43
ي انتظار،1981 ،
حر عى ورق
בהמתנה,1981 ,
דיו על נייר
Waiting, 1981,
ink on paper
38/28
مستهدف،1981 ،
حر عى ورق
מבוקש,1981 ,
דיו על נייר
Wanted, 1981,
ink on paper
38/28
امرأة -ملصق ليوم امرأة
العامي،1989 ،
حر عى ورق
אישה -פוסטר ליום
האישה הבינלאומי,
,1989
דיו על נייר
Woman, poster
for International
Women’s Day, 1989,
ink on paper
70/50
ايكروس،1989 ،
تقنية طباعية عى ورق
איקרוס,1989 ,
הדפס על נייר
Icarus, 1989,
print on paper
54/50
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
امرأة من امخيم،1951 ،
طباعة شبكية
אישה ממחנה,1951 ,
הדפס רשת
Woman from a
Camp,1991,
net print
74/59
شق،1992 ،
تقنية طباعية عى ورق
שבר,1992 ,
טכניקת הדפס על נייר
Fragment, 1992, print
technique on paper
66/50
جذوع،1991 ،
ألوان مختلطة عى ورق
גזעים,1991 ,
צבעים מעורבים על נייר
Trunks, 1991, mixed
colors on paper
70/48
تكوين،1996 ،
تقنية طباعية عى ورق
קומפוזיציה,1996 ,
טכניקת הדפס על נייר
Composition, 1996,
print technique on
paper
77/66
طائرة ورقية ي الشاطئ،
،1993
زيت عى قماش
עפיפון נייר בחוף,1993 ,
שמן על בד
Paper Kite on the
Beach, 1993,
oil on canvas
117/97
شباك،1998 ،
رقائق نحاسية ،مواد مختلطة
عى خشب
חלון,1998 ,
יריעות נחושת
Window, 1998,
copper foil
120/95
واجهة نحاسية (تكريم عائلة
مسنة من وادي روشميا)،
،1997
رقائق نحاسية
חזית נחושת (מחווה
למשפחה קשישה מואדי
רושמאיא),1997 ,
יריעות נחושת
Copper Façade
(hommage to an
elderly family from
Wadi Rushmiyya),
1997, copper foil
100/75
من وحي شباك ي مدينة
الدوحة،1995 ،
ألوان مائية عى ورق
בהשראת חלון בעיר
דוחא,1995 ,
צבעי מים על נייר
Inspired by a Window
in Doha, 1995,
watercolors on paper
95/86
سيدتان،1984 ،
زيت عى قماش
שתי גברות,1984 ,
שמן על בד
Two Ladies, 1984,
oil on canvas
120/90
ما شاء الله ،1999 ،صاج
وحبال عى لوحة خشبية
מא שאא’ אללה,1999 ,
פח ,נחושת וחבלים על
משטח עץ
Masha’allah, 1999,
tin, copper and rope
on wood
122/84
تكوين،1999 ،
رقائق نحاسية عى لوحة
خشبية
קומפוזיציה,1999 ,
נחושת על משטח עץ
Composition, 1999,
copper on wood
152/109/7
امرأة أمام الحاجز،1999 ،
تقنية طباعية
אישה מול מחסום,
,1999
טכניקת הדפס
Woman at
Checkpoint, 1999,
print technique
60/40
معتقل،1990 ،
تقنية طباعية عى ورق
מעצר,1990 ,
טכניקת הדפס על נייר
Detention, 1990,
print technique on
paper
70/50
منطار،1995 ،
ألوان مائية عى ورق
מצפה,1995 ,
צבעי מים על נייר
Observation Point,
1995,
watercolors on paper
71/58
أيقونة،1999 ،
أكريليك عى ورق
אייקון,1999 ,
אקריליק על נייר
Icon, 1999,
acrylic on paper
80/55
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
شخوص أمام الجدار،2004 ،
أكريليك عى قماش
דמויות מול החומה,
,2004
אקריליק על בד
Figures Facing the
Wall, 2004,
acrylic on canvas
75/65
جدار،2005 ،
مواد مختلطة عى قماش
גדר,2005 ,
טכניקה מעורבת על בד
Wall, 2005,
mixed techniques on
canvas
90/80
كواشن وبساط،2007 ،
(تكريم لخالتي الاجئة ي
عمان) ،مواد مختلطة عى
قماش
קושאנים ושטיח,2007 ,
(מחווה לדודתי בעמאן),
טכניקה מעורבת על בד
Kushans and Rug,
2007, (hommage to
my aunt in Amman),
mixed techniques on
canvas
95/60
والدتي خرية ،2009 ،مواد
مختلطة عى قماش
אמי ח’איריה,2009 ,
טכניקה מעורבת על בד
My Mother
Khayriya, 2009,
mixed techniques on
canvas
90/70
بنانر عى ح ّ
طه فلسطينية،
،2005
مواد مختلطة عى قماش
גולות על כאפייה
פלסטינית,2005 ,
טכניקה מעורבת על בד
Beads on a
Palestinian Keiyyeh,
2005, mixed
techniques on canvas
70/65
بقايا فسيفساء،2005 ،
أطال قر امنية ،شمال
طريا ،مواد مختلطة عى
قماش
שאריות פסיפס,2005 ,
חורבות ארמון אל-מניה,
צפון טבריה ,טכניקה
מעורבת על בד
Mosaic Remnants,
2005, the ruins of
al-Minaya Palace,
north Tiberias, mixed
techniques on canvas
90 x 80
باطة من وادي الصليب،
،2004
مواد مختلطة
בלאטה מואדי א-סאליב,
2004
טכניקה מעורבת
,Tile from Wadi Salib
2004
mixed techniques
50/40/10
قناع (تكريم للسيدة
اأفغانية)،2003 ،
مواد مختلطة
מסיכה (מחווה לאישה
האפגאנית),2003 ,
טכניקה מעורבת
Mask, (hommage to
an Afghan woman),
2003,
mixed techniques
50/38/12
السيدة «ع» ،2007 ،أكريليك
عى قماش
גברת ע’ ,2007 ,אקריליק
על בד
Madame A, 2007,
acrylic on canvas
100/75
غزة ،2008 ،2008
مواد مختلطة عى قماش
داخل صندوق
עזה ,2008 ,2008
טכניקה מעורבת על בד
בתוך תבנית
Gaza 2008, 2008,
mixed techniques on
canvas in a mold
80/70/10
تكوين،2000 ،
مواد مختلطة عى ورق
קומפוזיציה,2000 ,
טכניקה מעורבת על נייר
Composition, 2000,
mixed techniques on
canvas
86/70
سرين ،2010 ،لذكرى قرية
سرين امهدمة ،مواد مختلطة
ي صندوق
סירין ,2010 ,מחווה לזכר
הכפר ההרוס סירין,
טכניקה מעורבת
Sirin, hommage
to the demolished
Kafr Sirin, mixed
techniques
85/35
شظايا،2005،
طباعة تقنية عى ورق
שברים,2005 ,
הדפס טכני על נייר
Fragments, 2005,
technical print on
paper
80/55
تكوين ،2010،خيمة ي
العراء،
مواد مختلطة عى قماش
קומפוזיציה ,2010 ,אוהל
תחת כפת השמיים,
טכניקה מעורבת על בד
Composition, 2010,
tent under the sky,
mixed techniques on
canvas
100/80
تكوين،2010 ،
خيش أكريليك ومواد مختلطة
קומפוזיציה,2010 ,
יוטה ,צבעי אקריליק
וטכניקה מעורבת
Composition, 2010,
jute, acrylic and
mixed techniques
85/76
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
النصب التذكاري لشهداء يوم اأرض ي سخنن ،1978 ،باطون مسلح ومعدن اأمنيوم
האנדרטה לזכר חללי יום האדמה בסח’נין ,1978 ,בטון ותבליטי אלומיניום
Monument to the Land Day fallen at Sakhnin, 1978, concrete and aluminum reliefs
النصب التذكاري تخليدا ً إعان قيام بلدية شفاعمرو (ي العام
،1985 ،)1910رخام ومعدن الرونز
האנדרטה לזכר הכרזת הקמת עיריית שפרעם,
( ,1985 ,)1910שיש ותבליטי ברונזה
Monument commemorating the declaration of
the Shfaram Municipality (1910), 1985, marble
and bronze reliefs
النصب التذكاري لشهداء قرية
كفر مندا وشهيد هبّة اأقى،
،2001باطون ورخام ومعدن
الرونز
האנדרטה לזכר החללים
בכפר מנדא וחללי
התקוממות אל-אקצה,
,2001בטון ,שיש
ותבליטי ברונזה
Monument to the
fallen of Kafr Manda
and the al-Aqsa
Uprising, 2001,
concrete, marble and
bronze reliefs
جدارية العلم ي مدرسة
إعدادية ،2006 ،قرية عبلن،
معدن أمنيوم
תבליט קיר“ -המדע”
בחטיבת הביניים,2006 ,
כפר עבלין ,תבליטי
אלומיניום
Science, wall relief
at Ibelin Junior
High School, 2006,
aluminum reliefs
فسيفساء ي واجهة كنيسة
«السيدة» ،1985 ،حيفا
التحتى ،أحجار رخامية
פסיפס בחזית כנסיית
א-סיידה ,1985 ,חיפה
תחתית ,אבני שיש
Mosaic on the
a-Saida Church
façade, 1985,
downtown Haifa,
marble stones
النصب التذكاري (تكريم
مدينة عمان) ،1998 ،ي
ساحة امتحف الوطني ،عمان،
رخام
האנדרטה (מחווה לעיר
עמאן) ,1998 ,ברחבת
המוזיאון הלאומי ,עמאן,
שיש
Monument
(hommage to
Amman), 1998,
National Museum
piazza, Amman,
marble
النصب التذكاري لشهداء قرية
كفر كنا ،2000 ،رخام برونز
ومعدن اأمنيوم
האנדרטה לחללי כפר
כנא ,2000 ,שיש ,תבליטי
ברונזה ואלומיניום
Monument to the
fallen of Kafr Kana,
2000, marble, bronze
and aluminum reliefs
عمل إنشائي ،2006 ،شجرة
امعرفة ي ساحة مدرسة
«عمَ ال» ،قرية الزرازير ،معدن
اأمنيوم وفسيفساء
מיצב ,2006 ,עץ הדעת
ברחבת בית ספר “עמל”,
כפר זראזיר ,תבליטי
אלומיניום ופסיפס
Installation, 2006,
The Tree of
Knowledge, in the
Amal schoolyard,
Kafr Zarzir,
aluminum reliefs and
mosaic
جدارية ي وادي النسناس
( تكريم للصحفي والقائد
صليبا خميس) ،2007 ،حديد
وأمنيوم
תבליט קיר בואדי
ניסנאס( ,מחווה
לעיתונאי סליבא
ח’מיס) ,2007 ,ברזל
מחורר ואלומיניום
Wall reliefs in Wadi
Nisnas (hommage
to the journalist
Saliba Hamis), 2007,
perforated iron and
aluminum
مقطع من جدارية ي مدرسة
إعدادية ،2006 ،قرية عبلن،
كراميك وصفائح حديد
קטע מתבליט קיר
בחטיבת ביניים,2006 ,
כפר עבלין ,קרמיקה
וברזל
Part of the wall
relief at Ibelin Junior
High School, 2006,
ceramic and iron
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
Works
184
Illustrations titles
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
26.
27.
29.
31.
32.
33.
34.
39.
40.
±π∑
Abed Abdi, pen and ink drawing, no. 10 in the portfolio, The Messiah Rises, 1973
Abed Abdi, Refugee in a Tent, 1973
Abed Abdi, print no. 4, lithograph, Revelation of the New Messiah, 1973
Ismail Shammout, Where To…?, 1953
Ismail Shammout, We Shall Return, 1954
Abed Abdi, print no 8, charcoal drawing, Refugees in the Desert, 1973
Abed Abdi, print no. 2, pen and ink drawing, Women, 1973
Abed Abdi, print no. 1, Weeping Woman, 1973
Käthe Kollwitz, print, The Widow, 1922-1923
Abed Abdi, print no. 6, pen and ink drawing, Sleeping in the Desert, 1973
Abed Abdi, print no. 11, pen and ink drawing, The Dam, 1973
Abed Abdi, print no. 12, pen and ink drawing, Wild Landscape, 1973
Abed Abdi, from Emile Habibi, Mandelbaum Gate, 1968
Abed Abdi, from Emile Habibi, The Pessoptimist: The Secret Life of Saeed Abu el-Nahs alMotashel, 1977 [frontispiece]
Abed Abdi, from Emile Habibi, The Pessoptimist: The Secret Life of Saeed Abu el-Nahs alMotashel, 1977 [page facing the frontispiece]
Abed Abdi, from Emile Habibi, The Pessoptimist: The Secret Life of Saeed Abu el-Nahs alMotashel, 1977 [p. 193]
Abed Abdi, from Salman Natour, Wa Ma Nasina, cover illustration [from the story Being
Small at Al-Ain… Growing Up in Lod]
Abed Abdi, from Salman Natour, Wa Ma Nasina, What Is Left of Haifa, Al-Jadid, December
1980
Abed Abdi, from Deeb Abdi, Thoughts of Time, 1993 [cover illustration]
Abed Abdi, Untitled, 1979
Abed Abdi, from Salman Natour, Wa Ma Nasina, From the Well to the Mosque of Ramla, AlJadid, November 1981
Abed Abdi, from Salman Natour, Wa Ma Nasina, Like this Cactus in Eilabun, Al-Jadid, March
1981 (no. 22)
24, 25 Abed Abdi, from Salman Natour, Wa Ma Nasina, Trap in Khobbeizeh, Al-Jadid, June
1981
Abed Abdi, general strike poster, 1975, The National Popular Conference for the Defense of
the Land, held on 18.10.1975, in a Nazareth cinema: Save What Remains Of The Lands, Fight
Against Expropriation So We Do Not Lose What Is Left
28, Gershon Knispel, Land Day Portfolio, 1978
30, Abed Abdi, Land Day Portfolio, 1978
Abed Abdi, Gershon Knispel, aluminum cast, the Land Day monument model, 1977
Gideon Gitai, Abed Abdi and Gershon Knispel, erecting the monument in Sakhnin, March
1978
Abed Abdi, Gershon Knispel, The Land Day monument in Sakhnin [photographed in March
2007]
- 38, Abed Abdi, Gershon Knispel, The Land Day monument in Sakhnin, [photographed in
March 2007]
The Land Day portfolio, Gideon Gitai, Abed Abdi, Gershon Knispel, 1978
Abed Abdi, Land Day commemoration poster, 1980, Here We Stay, Committee for the Defense
of the Arab Lands
This important artist, whose great work was compared by the award’s panel of
judges to that of Nahum Gutman, has devoted himself for close to ifty years to
a wide range of artistic endeavor in varied ields: painting, murals, illustration,
prints, sculpture, graphic design and monument design. However, I have chosen
to focus on two expressions of his multifaceted work – “the art of print” and
the Land Day monument at Sakhnin. This choice was based on the degree of
exposure to the broad Palestinian public and its role as a “memorial site” and a sort
of “Palestinian museum”, and of course, their contribution to the development
of the Nakba theme, depictions of refugees, and the struggle for the land in the
national collective memory of the Arab minority living in Israel.
±π∏
The caption of the poster is identical to the tile of Tawik Ziad’s poem “Hunna
Bakun”40, which says, inter alia: “Here on your hearts we shall stay as a bastion.
In hunger, naked, we shall challenge”.41 The repetition of the poem’s title and the
allusion to its content is not random, since the poem is considered to be one of the
most important expressions of resistance literature written by the Arabs of 1948.
Moreover, the poem and its title are directly connected with collective Palestinian
memory by unequivocally expressing the notion of summud (steadfastness) and the
deep connection to the soil of the homeland despite the Nakba and what followed it.
[39]
[40]
Afterword
In 2008 Abed Abdi became the irst Arab artist living in Israel to win the Minister
of Science, Culture and Sport Award, together with six other artists, all of whom
were Jews and younger than him. In other words, he was the irst Arab artist to
gain recognition by mainstream Israeli culture. Replying to a question from an
interviewer regarding the excitement generated by the event in the Israeli media,
Abdi said, “If I really am the irst Arab artist, it is neither a compliment to me
nor to 60 years of the State of Israel”.42 Indeed, it seems that thus Abdi faithfully
summed up the attitude of both the state and the Israeli art establishment towards
Palestinian art inside the Green Line. Abdi, the proliic and groundbreaking artist
in so many respects in the sphere of Palestinian art, was forced to wait until he was
sixty-six to gain this recognition.
40 Naseer Aruri and Edmund Ghareeb (eds.), Enemy of the Sun: Poetry of Palestinian Resistance, Washington, Drum Press, 1970, p. 66.
41 Balas, Shimon. 1978: 85.
42 See Anat Zohar, “It Doesn’t Compliment Me or the State”, at http://bidur.nana10.co.il/
Article/?ArticleID=600807
±ππ
≤∞∞
for the monument portfolio by Samih al-Qasim and Joshua Sobol, and those
written by the artists themselves.
[38]
In his text, Abdi wrote:
Generations come and go and each one leaves behind it
monuments whose existence continues in the present. These
remnants sadden me, a sadness that comes to me from within
the uprightness of the palm tree, the depth of the cactus’s
roots, from the height of a derelict mosque, or a rusty church
bell that will peal no longer. I feel the wounds of the continuum
of the not too distant past and its suffering: the rocky surfaces
of the bastion’s stone walls lay strewn before the bulldozers
of “progress”, and I have tasted its saltiness which is similar
to that beading a dark-skinned forehead. The same sweat that
bitterness-laden history has turned into heavy tears falling
onto the gravestones that have become monuments in the
villages of Sakhnin, Kafr Qassem, Tantura and Deir Yassin.
The monument we have erected in Sakhnin will be a witness
and oath to our eternal belonging to this land and its prayer,
and to its sons who answer the call to defend their motherland.39
Together with the Arabic texts by Abdi and Knispel the portfolio contains detail of
Gideon Gitai’s photographs: a mother, her head covered and wearing a lowered
village dress holding a baby, surrounded by the rest of her children amid the ruins
of their demolished house (no 39). From a visual standpoint this image is also
very reminiscent of scenes of destruction of homes in refugee camps, and thus
visually links the fate of the Arabs of 1948 with that of their brethren outside
Israel. Hence, for Abdi’s part the monument in Sakhnin is a way station along
the continuum of “gravestones that have become monuments in the villages of
Sakhnin, Kafr Qassem, Tantura and Deir Yassin”, a continuum relecting the
continuing Palestinian Nakba through the sweat and tears of its victims.
This photograph appeared in 1980 in a popular poster designed by Abdi to mark
the fourth anniversary of Land Day. In the poster, the slogan of the struggle that
focuses on saving “what is left” was replaced with the challenge “Here We Stay!”
(no.40). In the lower part of the poster there is a photograph of a man raising his
hand that is grasping a bundle of cut barbwire. Above the upper piece of wire is
embedded a photograph of a woman surrounded by her children standing amid
the ruins of their home.
39 Abdi, Abed, 1978. “Monument to the Present, The Story of a Monument, Land Day in Sakh-nin, 1976-1978”, Abed Abdi and Gershon Knispel (eds.), Arabesque, Haifa.
≤∞±
was shot in Taibeh. On the left edge of this panel, towards which the women
are facing, an abstract embryonic igure seemingly bursts from within the panel
stretching its hand forward in a gesture of either grasping or a plea for help.
The fourth panel (no. 37) completes the sarcophagus image by presenting two
igures that seem to be corpses lying one on top of the other in a lateral, serene
composition. The work on this panel is very reminiscent of Soviet memorial art.
Finally, separate from this part of the monument stands a free sculpture of a plow
on its own pedestal: when the tillers of the soil are murdered, the plow remains
abandoned and broken (no. 38). The plow’s handles and axle are sculpted at a
45° angle, and from a certain viewpoint appear to be hands raised in supplication
to heaven. In this sculpture there is special emphasis on the sense of molded clay
that endows it with an organic appearance of patina and antiquity.
In general terms it may be stated that women are presented in most parts of the
monument as working the land and symbolizing mourning and lamentation. The
choice of focusing on igures of women was a joint decision by the monument’s
two creators, who devote a central place to women’s igures in their other works.
In any event, this choice runs counter to the period’s newspapers’ focus on the
igure of the male peasant, albeit it connects with the perception of the woman
as “Mother Earth” in both Arabic and modern literature, and also in Palestinian
art.38 However, Abdi’s and Knispel’s women tillers of the soil are completely
different from the village women’s igures derived from this perception in the art
of Ismail Shammout, for example. Their representation highlights their being
“proletarian”, diligent and dedicated working women, not ideal, idyllic allegorical
igures.
The overall impression evoked by the two parts of the monument is one of a
meld of the local, the speciic and the universal. In addition to the element of
commemoration and underscoring the Jewish-Arab cooperation that the Israeli
Communist Party inscribed on its escutcheon, the monument represents not only
a Social Realism approach, but also a Socialist Realism one. The joint work of
Abed Abdi and Gershon Knispel highlights both connection to the land and a call
for universal justice. This emphasis is also expressed in the texts written especially
38 The igure of the woman in the village as a representation of the Palestinian homeland consti�tutes a central motif in Palestinian art from the 1950s to the present day. In the context of my
research on Palestinian art I contended that this centrality of the woman’s igure in canonical
Palestinian art is inluenced by and expresses the way in which national movements perceive
the roles of gender. See my MA thesis: Tal Ben Zvi, 2004. “Between Nationality and Gender:
Representations of the Female Body in Palestinian Women’s Art”, Tel Aviv University. A further
discussion of Palestinian women’s art appears in the catalogues: Tal Ben Zvi, 2006. Hagar – Contemporary Palestinian Art, Jaffa: Hagar Association; Tal Ben Zvi, 2006. Biographies: 6 Exhibitions at
Hagar Art Gallery, Jaffa: Hagar Association; Tal Ben Zvi and Yael Lerer 2001. Self-Portrait: Palestinian Women’s Arts, Tel Aviv: Andalus.
≤∞≤
[34]
[35]
[36]
[37]
is a site intended to remind the public and individuals of the events of the past,
to mark meanings for them, and offer them a source of dynamic legitimacy. As a
“memorial site” it also continues to live in the ceremonies held there every year
and in the photographs and news items documenting it35.
Description of the Monument
Knispel and Abdi designed a kind of four-sided sarcophagus covered with
aluminum reliefs highlighting the connection of the Arab minority with its land
(no. 33). The aluminum reliefs were fashioned in a way that endows them with
the appearance of clay.
[31]
[32]
[33]
On the irst panel (no. 34) a woman is bending and clutching a large jug, and
two other women stooping, one harvesting with a sickle and the other sowing
seeds. Beneath their arms, in the bottom right-hand corner, is an inscription in
English, Arabic and Hebrew: “Designed by A. Abdi and G. Knispel to deepen
understanding between the two peoples”; on the second panel (no. 35) a sculpted
woman is bending, holding seeds in her left hand and scattering them with her
right.36 It continues with a separate panel in which, between the woman and
the edge of the image beginning on the side, inscribed in Hebrew and English
are the words: “30.3.1976, In Memory of Those Who Fell on Land Day”. On
the third panel (no. 36), sculpted successively in proile are two grieving women
kneeling and covering their faces with their hands.37 Between the two women is an
inscription in Arabic: “They fell so we could live. They live. The fallen of the day
of defense of the land, 30 March 1976”, and beneath it are inscribed the names
of those killed and their villages: Khair Muhammad Yassin of Arabeh, Raja
Hassin Abu-Ria, Khader Abed Khaleileh, and Khadija Shawhana of Sakhnin,
Muhammad Yusuf Taha of Kafr Kana, and Rif ’at Zuheiri of Nur Shams, who
35 Yael Zerubavel emphasized that commemoration is a central concept in the understanding of
the dynamics of change that take place in memory. Collective memory is realized in varied commemoration forums, when by means of these commemorative rituals groups create, amend,
rehabilitate and process, through negotiation, their common memories of particular events and
seminal moments in accordance with the changing needs of the present. From this standpoint,
public commemoration is not only a more accessible site for research of the formation of the
collective memory, but it also enables following the changes and reproductions taking place in
the collective memory of a speciic community over time. See, Zerubavel, Yael, 1995. Recovered
Roots: Collective Memory and the Making of Israeli National Tradition, Chicago, University of Chicago
Press, pp. 4-13.
36 The woman’s broad, almost Indian-like face and heavy body call to mind the images of women
in the monumental murals done by the Mexican artists Diego Rivera (1886�1957) and David
Alfaro Siqueiros (1896-1974). Abdi met the latter in Dresden in 1969.
37 Clearly evident here is the inluence of Kollwitz’s “The Grieving Parents” (1914�1932), com�memorating the artist’s son Peter who fell in World War I (and who lost her grandson in World
War II). She spent seventeen years working on the monument commemorating her son, which
was unveiled in 1932 in a cemetery in Flanders where her son fell and was buried. The monument shows Peter’s mother (a self-portrait of the artist) and father (a portrait of Karl Kollwitz)
kneeling at their son’s side, begging his forgiveness.
≤∞≥
in the project. The two formulated the monument’s ideological-visual format
and began work on the preliminary sketches, four of which are included in the
monument portfolio (nos. 27-30) that was published in 1978, after the monument
was erected.32
Several months after they were approached, on 30 March 1977, the anniversary
of Land Day, the two presented a model of the monument to a well attended
gathering of the Galilee Arab Councils Committee. The model (90 X 60 X 30 cm)
is comprised of two separate elements: a kind of sarcophagus made up of panels
of aluminum reliefs presenting a narrative continuum that moves from images of
women tilling the soil of the homeland to grieving women, and inally to bodies.
There is also a free sculpture of a plow set on a separate pedestal (no. 31).
In the last week of March 1978, work on construction of the monument
commenced in the Sakhnin cemetery on the assumption that this would protect it
from harm, since the Israeli security forces would avoid entering the site. First, the
concrete base was cast (no. 32). This took several hours and was done by numerous
workmen from Sakhnin. In the course of the work the police arrested Sakhnin
council head Jamal Taraba on a charge of authorizing illegal construction, but
released him several hours later.33
The unveiling ceremony was held on Thursday, 30 March 1978, and since then,
every year on that date the monument is the center of the Land Day memorial
ceremonies in the Galilee. On the one hand, the ceremonies relect the seminal
place of Land Day in Palestinian national culture, while on the other they serve
as a platform for the various political, social and cultural struggles engendered
by every period. From a historical standpoint, 1976 marked only one decade
from the end of the military government period. However, as it transpired, the
end of military government did not mark the end of what might be termed the
“internal occupation and oppression” of the Arab population of Israel, or the
discrimination against it. Yet Land Day became the irst public event in which
conditions matured for creating a permanent mark in the public arena in the
form of a place for gathering, mourning, commemoration and remembrance. It
became a “memorial site” in the full sense of the term coined by Pierre Nora.34 It
32 The portfolio, graphically designed by Abed Abdi, was published several months after the
monument was erected. Apart from the four preliminary sketches, also included in it are photographs taken by the then photographer of Al-Ittihad, Gideon Gitai, and texts by Samih alQasim, Joshua Sobol, and the monument’s creators, Abed Abdi and Gershon Knispel.
33 Sorek, Tamir, 2008. “Cautious Commemoration: Localism, Communalism and Nationalism in
Palestinian Memorial Monuments in Israel”, in Comparative Studies in Society and History, 50 (2): p.
330.
34 Nora, Pierre, 1989. Les Lieux de Memoire, Paris, Editions Gallimard.
≤∞¥
[27]
[28]
[29]
[30]
on protection of the lands that took place on Saturday, 17 October 1975 in a
Nazareth cinema. This event’s slogan was “Save What Remains Of The Lands,
Fight Against Expropriation So We Do Not Lose What Is Left” (no. 26). The
dramatic design of the text in red and white on a black background was done in
the best tradition of socialist posters. At its center, printed in a thin white frame
is an adapted version of a 1971 woodcut presenting a group of people raising
their clenched ists. The united group that seemingly bursts out of the woodcut’s
left edge and ills some three quarters of the surface, moves to the right against a
background of abstract broken lines (the original work was published in Al-Ittihad
on 7 October 1971). In the poster, Abdi ascribes the people’s protest to the land
issue by putting agricultural tools – scythes and hoes – in the hands of some of
them, which did not appear in the original work.
[26]
In 1977, a year after the Land Day events, the secretariat of the National
Committee for the Defense of Arab Lands, headed by Saliba Khamis, decided to
erect a monument commemorating Land Day and its victims.30 The meeting at
which the decision was taken was held in the home of Kafr Manda council leader
Muhammad Zeidan, and it was taken in consultation with the then head of the
Sakhnin council Jamal Taraba. At the meeting it was also decided to approach
Abed Abdi and ask him to take the task upon himself.
Once the committee had approached Abdi, he invited his old friend Gershon
Knispel,31 who had considerable experience in monument design, to participate
30 On the importance of monuments and memorial sites, Israel Gershoni notes that the memorial
site is a place of memory of the kind described by Pierre Nora. He says that beyond it being a
one-time thing or recycled ritual, commemoration is a dynamic process. However, the concrete
act of establishing a memorial site creates “a moment of preservation of collective memory”
that from a historical standpoint is deined and distinguished (Gershoni, 2006: 26). With regard
to these representations of the past, Moshe Zuckermann notes that the ‘one�timeness’ of a
historical event is absolute and cannot be resurrected. Accordingly, representation of a historical event is a substitute whereby consciousness of the present attempts to penetrate that of the
past. According to him, these representations and motifs act as codes: they contain the coded
details of the collective consciousness, but at the same time they serve as a connecting link with
those elements excluded from consciousness and stored in memory (Zuckermann, 1993: 6�7).
For further reading, see Israel Gershoni, 2006. Pyramid for the Nation: Memory, Commemoration and
Nationalism in Twentieth Century Egypt, Am Oved, Tel Aviv (Hebrew); Moshe Zuckermann, 1993.
Holocaust in the Sealed Room, published by the author, Tel Aviv.
31 Gershon Knispel was born in 1932 in Köln, Germany, and grew up in Haifa. In 1954 he com�pleted his studies at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem. In the early 1960s
he was living in Brazil but returned to Israel in the wake of the military coup that took place in
Brazil in 1964. In the 1960s and 70s he was the Haifa Municipality’s artistic advisor. In 1994
Knispel returned to Brazil, to San Paolo, where he lives to this day. His rich artistic ability and
experience, coupled with his extensive contacts, which enabled the artists to cast the Land Day
monument in the Haifa Municipality’s workshop, made his contribution to the monument’s
erection all the more signiicant. Knispel designed several monuments in the 1970s: the Kfar
Galim Youth Village monument (1970), the monument in Haifa’s Ahuza neighborhood (1974),
and the one in the Haifa Memorial Garden (1975). See, Esther Levinger, 1993.War Memorials in
Israel, Hakibbutz Hameuhad, 31 (Hebrew).
≤∞µ
against the church door, and the death of Sama’an al-Shufani, the janitor of the
Maronite church, whose body lay on the ground for three days.
In Trap in Khobbeizeh29 the wrinkled old sheikh tells the story of a shepherd trapped
in a mineield near Khobbeizeh in Wadi `Ara, the total destruction of the village,
its inhabitants’ struggle to return to their lands after they were declared a closed
military zone, and the trial of one of the villagers for trespassing. He goes on
to describe the massacre in Khobbeizeh in which 25 men were taken from the
village, forced to kneel beside a cactus hedge, and were shot to death in full view of
the women and children. The narrator dwells on the story of one of the victims,
the only son of Abou Daoud Abou Siakh, who begged the soldiers to let him take
his son’s place. The soldiers denied his request and shot his son, the father loses his
mind, and for years afterward sees his dead son’s face among the village children.
[23]
The three igures accompanying the story do not describe the killing and horror,
but the stunned expression of the villagers watching the atrocity. On the story’s
frontispiece (no. 23) a group of grieving women with their heads covered is
seen, one of whom is bending her head to a small child clinging to her waist.
In this work Abdi returns to the circle motif, which here is seen as if through a
magnifying glass or as a close-up of the faces of the weeping, wailing women.
Seen in the narrow and elongated illustration that appears with the story, are
upright, grave-faced men with big, wide eyes and big, emphasized hands (no. 24).
The third illustration (no. 25), a lateral woodcut printed on the lower part of the
two columns of page 25, presents grief�stricken igures standing behind barbwire
and wooden fence posts.
The Story of a Monument
The irst Land Day took place on 30 March 1976 in protest against the
government’s decision to expropriate 20,000 dunams (approx. 5,000 acres) of
land in the Sakhnin area for the purpose of “Judaizing” the Galilee. The leaders
of the Israeli Communist Party and the heads of the Arab councils in the Galilee
called for a day of general strike and protest demonstrations on 30 March. The
demonstrations were held mainly in Sakhnin, Arabeh and Deir Hanna, in the
course of which IDF forces clashed with the demonstrators, many of whom were
wounded and six were killed.
[24]
In the mid�1970s the struggle intensiied, as did the discourse conducted by the
Arab minority in Israel since 1948 on the lands and their expropriation. Abeb
Abdi irst addressed this subject in a poster he designed for a national conference
[25]
29 Natour, Salman, “Trap in Khobbeizeh”, Wa Ma Nasina, Al-Jadid, June.
≤∞∂
all it can offer the refugees is consolation, not real protection and rescue; it is
a mythological, religious and community igure detached from its land and the
source of its power.
In contrast, the old and wrinkled sheikh, the narrator of all Natour’s Wa Ma Nasina
stories, who also appears in the majority of the illustrations that accompanied
these stories in Al-Jadid, represents a man of lesh and blood. However, there is
a tension between the text, in which the sheikh is the narrator who remembers
in detail all the events of the Nakba (names of people, dates and places), and the
universality of the illustration, as it is manifested in the archetypical face of the
old man and the faces of the other igures in the illustration series.
[21]
Thus, for example, the illustration that accompanies the story From the Well to
the Mosque of Ramla,27 (no. 21) incorporates heavy religious allusions with real
suffering. The old man with his deeply furrowed face appears here as if cruciied
in sacriice or as protecting the igures of the wailing women standing behind
him with a dead, shrouded body lying beside them on wooden boards. Here,
Natour’s narrator relates the story of the bomb that exploded in the middle
of Ramla’s Wednesday market in March 1948, killing many. He describes the
ensuing chaos and the numerous bodies lying among the market stalls and crates
of fruit and vegetables. The incorporation of the religious image into the scene of
mourning against the background of a few buildings, and the schematic depiction
of a mosque’s minaret charges the event with timeless and placeless symbolism.
Despite the highlighted word “Ramla” in stylistic script that appears within the
background architecture, the body lying with its face hidden is simultaneously a
speciic and universal victim.
In other illustrations, the dialectical tension between detailed text and symbolic
illustration recurs. An example of this is the illustration that accompanies the
story Like this Cactus in Eilabun28 (no.22). It depicts a corpse lying on the ground at
the foot of a bare tree, and the igure of a woman who is touching the body’s face
with a hesitant hand. Behind them, several women are sitting covering their faces
in shock. The igures are situated in a desolate space, far from the village that is
seen on the horizon, and far from any source of help. The story opens with a long
scene in which Natour describes the dirt road leading to Eilabun, the surrounding
ields and mountains, and the tension between a young Palestinian woman and her
children and an Israeli soldier who is with them on a truck traveling from Eilabun
to Tiberias. Later, the narrator relates the story of the massacre in Eilabun, the
death of Azar, a poor man, the children’s favorite, who was killed while leaning
[22]
27 Natour, Salman, 1981. “From the Well to the Mosque of Ramla”, Wa Ma Nasina, Al-Jadid,
November.
28 Natour, Salman, 1981. “Like this Cactus in Eilabun”, Wa Ma Nasina, Al-Jadid, March.
≤∞∑
grandfather Abed el-Rahim was standing upright as if he were
challenging the waves and other things; he was looking back
at Haifa, as if they were saying goodbye to each other. For the
irst time he was leaving Haifa, and she was leaving him, and
she faded away bit by bit, and my grandfather Abed el-Rahim
watched the length of the shore from Haifa to Acre, the wheels
of a horse-drawn wagon bogging down in the moist sand.
A short journey, then we go back. That is what my grandfather
Abed el-Rahim said when I was still a little boy, hardly eight,
and I was afraid of the dark, of the sea. For the irst time in
my life I was sailing to an unknown world – unknown. From
the big mill they were shooting bullets like heavy rain, and my
grandmother Fatma el-Qala’awi hid us in her lap, continuously
reciting the Throne Verse from the Qur’an and we did not dare
raise our heads. So we remained where we were until we were
far from the shore and reached the deep sea, and approached
Acre. We stayed in Acre for a couple of weeks, its walls were
suffocated by refugees, and the refugees were suffocated by
crowds of immigrants who had escaped by land and sea to its
walls. A short time afterwards, Acre fell, and people left it by
land and sea.
We went on board at night and sailed deep into a world foreign
to Haifa and Acre. It was the beginning of a journey... and
another journey... and another (Deeb Abdi, 1991).26
The narrator, a child who is afraid of the dark and the sea, is waiting for a savior
to save him from his misery. The expectation of a savior to rescue him from
drowning is familiar to Abdi from his mother’s stories about El-Khader. This
character appears in Salman Natour’s story What Is Left of Haifa in which a group
of people is visiting Elijah’s (El-Khader’s) cave. They drink and eat, and when
they go into the sea somewhat tipsy they begin to drown. “The old people began
to pray: Please, Khader, save us, Khader”, writes Natour, and suddenly they saw
a man in a boat in the sea, but he disappeared like a grain of salt. And of course
nobody drowned.
This savior�messiah igure of El�Khader, as the Prophet Elijah, as Mar Gerais,
recurs in many of Abdi’s illustrations, two of which appear in the 1973 print
portfolio. Six years later, in an illustration from 1979 (no. 20) the savior reappears
as a manneristic igure, the folds of whose garment is reminiscent of those of
the saints in Byzantine icons. It lies with arms outstretched over a village, but
26 Abdi, Deeb, 1991. Thoughts of Time, Al-Ittihad, Haifa. First published in Al-Ittihad on 27 April.
≤∞∏
[20]
on the tower, and they dropped a yellow sulfur bomb on the
Jarini mosque clock, and the clock fell, and I said: the clock
has fallen and the homeland will follow.”
Haifa was not erased from the face of the homeland […] but
all its characteristics have changed […] The people of the Old
City of Haifa were mostly stonecutters and ishermen […]
They quarried the stones in Wadi Rushmia and sold them,
and later, when the British came and extended the harbor,
people started to work there as well […] Rifa’t was a skilled
isherman like no other, he had a black donkey which he used
to ride and look out to sea, and see where the ish gather, then
he would cast his net, and not miss even a single ish.
Time passed, and the sea began to bring people and take
people away. And Abu Zeid’s boats took the Arabs away…
Where to? To Acre Port…
Where to? To Beirut Port…
Where To? To hell…”( Natour, 1982)24
[19]
To a certain extent Salman Natour’s story about Haifa is based on the stories of
Abdi’s family. Thus, for instance, Rif ’at the isherman is Abdi’s great�uncle. The
detailed story of the family appears in the book written by Deeb Abdi (Abed
Abdi’s brother), Thoughts of Time, which was published posthumously in 1993.
In the book, short stories he had written and which had been published over the
years in Al-Ittihad were collected, including the story of the family’s grandfather
and his departure from Haifa in April 1948. The illustration on the cover (no. 19)
is also related to the departure from Haifa.25 The images in this illustration are
arranged in a composition of a cross, so that the horizontal line is formed from
the houses of Haifa, sketched in black and outlined by the waterline of the Port
of Haifa, while the vertical line is formed of a ishing boat, with heavily outlined
igures on it in black lines. The three igures in the foreground are in detail: the
igure of a woman holding a kind of package close to her body, the igure of an
older man and beside him, the igure of a young child holding on to him. Deeb
Abdi relates:
This is what our leaving Haifa for Acre on board British boats
was like […] In April, the sea was stormy, which is unusual at
that time of the year, and the high tide almost took us to the
deep waters, deeper and deeper to the bottom of the sea. My
24 What Is Left of Haifa was published in Hebrew and English in “Remembering Haifa”, Zochrot,
2004.
25 In 1996 Abdi returned to this illustration and created “Leaving Haifa” in which he used his
father as an updated model. His father passed away a year later.
≤∞π
combination of abstract and concrete elements. The cover of the book features
detail from an illustration originally made for story Being Small at Al-Ain… Growing
Up in Lod (no.17).22 The original illustration depicts three refugee women – one of
whom is sitting and tenderly embracing or protecting a baby, and behind her two
monumental igures completely covered in their heavy robes, against a backdrop
of a round sun and a strip of obscure buildings. In the detail featured on the
cover of the book the image has been cut and all that remains are a section of
the seated igure and a section of the igure standing to the left, her head bowed
towards the igure sitting at her feet. We Have Not Forgotten, states the title, and the
original version of the illustration, and especially the detail, indicates an abstract
consciousness of memory that is not located in a concrete geographic space.
The second illustration was originally published as part of the story What Is Left
of Haifa” (no.18) 23, and it is a detailed illustration of the city of Haifa. This story
relates to a speciic place and time, Haifa and 22 April 1948, the date of the
expulsion from the city, and thus both the story and the illustration are anchored
in time and place as a biographical, personal and collective milestone in the
history of the Palestinian residents of Haifa.
[17]
This illustration is reproduced and recurs beside the title of every short story in
this book and thus becomes a kind of “logo”, linking Abdi’s personal biography
as a native of Haifa with a symbolic sequence of wandering: from Haifa to Lod,
from Haifa to Ramle, from Haifa to Jaffa, etc. A space of geographic memory,
place names, details of streets, businesses and the names of people along the
continuum of the Palestinian Nakba.
This illustration is “The Father Illustration”, one that to a great extent contains
the essence of the Nakba iconography developed by Abdi over the years. It is
designed as a triptych: in the left�hand section a large number of igures are
sketched as black patches, becoming a human swarm that seeks to leave from the
Port of Haifa in haste and congestion; in the central part there is the igure of the
father, Qassem Abdi, with a simple worker’s hat on his head, and behind him the
“Kharat Al-Kanais” (church neighborhood), with its churches, mosque and clock
tower, as well as the family home. In the right-hand section there is a graphic
sketch of the ruins of the Old City of Haifa.
Natour relates in his story:
The wrinkled sheikh walks hand in hand with the years of this
century […] When the Nakba is mentioned he says: “I was
48” and adds, “I witnessed it on the day their cannons were
22 Natour, Salman, 1981, Being Small at Al-Ain… Growing Up in Lod, Wa Ma Nasina, Al-Jadid, October.
23 Natour, Salman, 1980, What Is Left of Haifa, Al-Jadid, October.
≤±∞
[18]
[16]
In a scene from Habibi’s book, Walaa’s parents, Saeed (the narrator) and Baqiyya,
are making their way to Tantura to save their son, and their story is related in
the following chapters until the son and mother mysteriously vanish into the
sea. Habibi’s ironic and allegorical text ridicules the efforts of the Israeli security
forces as they chase shadows. But this gloomy drawing of Abdi’s chooses to ignore
the text’s irony and instead depicts the parents’ terrible grief for their dead son.
The tension between the text’s ironic tone and the dark, expressive drawings is
present in each collaboration between Abdi and Habibi. Abdi translates Habibi’s
multifaceted irony into simple and accessible language, and focuses on the tragedy
of the Palestinian people. But the “consciousness of the torn homeland” described
by Habibi ably qualiies the entire gamut of Abdi’s work which is populated
by Palestinian villagers and city dwellers together with refugees and displaced
persons. Yet this “consciousness” also aspires to universal justice and equality,
and is expressed in a universal artistic language that crosses national borders and
identities.
4. Stories of the Nakba: “Wa Ma Nasina”19
The epitome of explicit reference to the Nakba in Abed Abdi’s work is a series
of his illustrations for the collection of short stories by Salman Natour “Wa Ma
Nasina” (We Have Not Forgotten). The stories were irst published in 1980�1982
in Al-Jadid, and later as part of a trilogy by the author.20 In the magazine, the title
of each story appears within or next to an illustration by Abdi. The names of
the stories are: So We Don’t Forget, So We Shall Struggle, Introduction by Dr. Emil Tuma;
A Beating Town in the Heart; “Discothèque” In the Mosque of Ein Hod; Om Al-Zinat is
Looking for the Shoshari; “Hadatha” Who Listens, Who Knows?; Hosha and Al-Kasayer;
Standing at the Hawthorn in Jalama; A Night at Illut; “Like this Cactus” in Eilabun; Death
Road from al-Birwa to Majd al-Kurum; Trap in Khobbeizeh; The Swamp… in Marj Ibn
Amer; What is Left of Haifa; The Notebook; Being Small at Al-Ain… Growing Up in Lod;
From the Well to the Mosque of Ramla; Three Faces of a City Called Jaffa.
The names of the stories relect a remapping of Mandatory Palestine, the lost
Palestine, resembling that which was carried out by the historian Walid Khalidi in
his book All That Remains.21
Unlike the format of the short stories published in Al-Jadid, in which a different
illustration by Abdi accompanied each story, only two were chosen for Salman
Natour’s book, which relect the space of Palestinian memory, comprising a
19 A previous version of the following appeared in the exhibition catalogue, “Abed Abdi: ‘Wa Ma
Nasina’”, of which I was curator in 2008 at Abed Abdi’s studio in Haifa; see the exhibition
website http://wa�ma�nasina.com/index.html
20 See, Salman Natour, Memory, Bethlehem, Badil Publishing House, 2007.
21 Khalidi, Walid, 1992, All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in
1948, Washington.
≤±±
“consciousness of the torn homeland” and the no-man’s-land as symbolizing a
dual schism of “those forced to live outside their land hoping to return to it, and
those living detached from the majority of their people and hoping to be reuniied
with them”.16
Following Abdi’s return to Israel he created illustrations for the original Arabic
edition of Emile Habibi’s The Pessoptimist: The Secret Life of Saeed Abu el-Nahs alMotashel, published in 1977.17 The one that opens the book (no. 14) is a close-up of
a man’s face partly concealed by his hand that is seemingly signaling the observerreader to halt – “No further”. The hand does not enable identiication of the
face, but seemingly invites the observer to read the man’s future in its lines. In this
way Abdi depicts Habibi, a product of Israeli reality and the complex identity of
the Palestinian minority living in it, which conducts a complex dialogue with its
environment as it holds its cards close to its chest.
[14]
In another illustration (no.15), which appears on the book’s frontispiece, a gaunt,
bearded old man is seen whose face is furrowed and whose eyes are sunken. He
is wearing a galabiya whose stripes/folds are heavily marked. His big left hand
rests on his chest and his right hand hangs at his side. Within the background
scribbles that partly appear to be an abstract representation of Arabic script,
planted beside his head is a barred aperture alluding to a prison or solitary
coninement cell. The story describes, inter alia, the imprisonment of Saeed
Abu el�Nahs al�Motashel in an Israeli jail and his ironic/cynical responses to the
Israeli interrogator’s questions, whereas Abdi’s illustration conveys sorrow and
exhaustion and is devoid of any form of irony.
An oppressive and melancholy atmosphere also pervades the drawing (no.16) that
appears facing p. 193 in the chapter entitled “More than Death Is Hard on Life,
this Story Is Hard to Believe”. In the illustration the partly-covered lower torso
of a corpse is seen lying on a wooden surface with its feet visible. Behind the
improvised stretcher stand grieving women dressed in the hijab, and in front of it
stands a man with his back to the observer, and who is turning his face away from
the body at his feet.18 A tear can be seen in the corner of the man’s eye.
16 Ibid.
17 Abdi’s drawings appear in Emile Habibi, 1974: Al-Waka’i al gharieba i ikhtifa Saeed Abu an-Nash alMotashel, Jerusalem. Translated into English without the illustrations: Emile Habibi, 1985. The
Secret Life of Saeed, the Pessoptimist , trans. Salma Khadra Jayyusi and Trevor LeGassick (London:
Zed Books).
18 A similar image of a corpse recurs in Abdi’s work and in it Käthe Kollwitz’s inluence can be
seen. Thus, for example, in the last print in the “Weavers Revolt” cycle (1897) Kollwitz depicts
two men bearing a corpse into a room of a hut in which the bodies of two workers are already
laid out.
≤±≤
[15]
Israeli Communist Party was of great signiicance, and thanks to it they were
preserved in the memory of the readers of these journals as the ultimate
representation of the Nakba.
[10]
[11]
[12]
3. “Mandelbaum Gate” and “The Pessoptimist” by Emile Habibi
From time to time during his years in Germany, Abdi visited his hometown,
Haifa. It was on these visits that he became acquainted with several notable
Palestinian writers and poets. During these years and later, many of his drawings
illustrated the publications of writers such as Emile Habibi, Anton Shammas,
Taha Muhammad Ali, Salman Natour, Samih al-Qasim, and others. In this
context Abdi’s igures on white paper draw their local, concrete force from the
textual literary space. From this standpoint his work is marked by the tremendous
textual inluence of Arabic literature, poetry and spoken language on Palestinian
art in general, by means of what Kamal Boullata terms “the hidden connotations
of words”.12
In his relationships with writers and poets, of particular note is the relationship
Abdi formed with Emile Habibi,13 who like him was a native of Haifa. The
fruitful collaboration between them was given expression, inter alia, in a 1968
illustration by Abdi for Habibi’s story “Mandelbaum Gate”14 (no. 13) done prior
to his return to Israel. Once a year, at Christmas, the Mandelbaum Gate, the
only crossing point between the two parts of pre-1967 Jerusalem, was opened for
Christian residents of Israel to visit their families in Jordanian refugee camps. The
gate symbolized both the division of Jerusalem and that of the Palestinian people
following the 1948 Nakba.15
In his illustration for “Mandelbaum Gate” Abdi depicts the parting of a wrinkled
woman leaning on a cane, and a girl-child with unkempt hair standing behind
her with head bowed by the barbwire fence. The girl’s heavy shadow follows the
woman, takes her right hand and returns like an echo on the shape of the cane
she is leaning on, held in her left hand. The igures are standing in a setting in
which only the vital details are drawn in an empty space – barbwire fences and
two tall posts with an allusive barrier between them. Abdi turns our gaze towards
the no-man’s-land at Mandelbaum Gate. Balas describes Habibi’s writing as
[13]
12 Boullata, Kamal, 1990. “Israeli and Palestinian Artists: Facing the Forest”, Kav 10: 171 (Hebrew).
13 Emile Habibi (1921-1996), author, publicist, and one of the founders of the Israeli Communist
Party, which he represented in several Knessets. He was also editor of Al-Ittihad for 45 years.
14 Abdi’s illustration appears in Emile Habibi, Sudaseyyat el-ayyam el-setta (The Six-Day Sextet),
Haifa, Al-Ittihad, 1970.
15 Balas, Shimon, 1978. Arabic Literature in the Shadow of War, Am Oved, Tel Aviv, pp. 33�35 (Hebrew).
≤±≥
a child and his mother, are seen sleeping alone on the ground under the sky.
The igures are covered with a sheet whose folds resemble a sharp and desolate
landscape reminiscent of the landscapes in the portfolio. The real landscape
in the drawing is summarized in a few broken lines marking the horizon, and
several electric poles and wires. Mother and child are extremely and dramatically
foreshortened. Despite the change of orientation from the heads downward and
not from the legs, this foreshortening calls to mind the work of one of the irst
artists to employ this technique, the Italian Renaissance artist Andrea Mantegna,
“The Lamentation over the Dead Christ” (circa 1480). To intensify the dramatic
effect Abdi exposed one of the mother’s feet, which peeps from under the sheet,
and this touching exposure of part of her body underscores the harsh conditions
of sleeping on the ground.
The last two prints in the portfolio are landscapes. The landscapes painted by
Abdi in Germany are characterized by a return to lengthened black lines and an
atmosphere of expressive tempest. In print no. 11, the pen and ink drawing “The
Dam” (no. 11), waves are seen breaking against a high rampart with towering
turrets, the silhouettes of minuscule igures on a high dam and a black sun drawn
in dark circular lines like a coil of wire. In print no. 12, the pen and ink drawing
“Wild Landscape” (no. 12), what appear to be rocks or tree stumps are seen, a
kind of path wending its way through a black and depressing landscape, clouds
drawn in expressive black lines, and a black sun. It is a landscape of consciousness,
a black landscape of scorched earth. In the absence of people and signs of life,
it seems that this earth represents a post-traumatic experience or a landscape
in the aftermath of a terrible catastrophe, after the Nakba. It is another means
of concretizing the atmosphere of the tragedy, the storm, and the struggle that
imbues all the works in the portfolio.
[7]
In a critique of the print portfolio that appeared in Zu Haderekh, A. Niv (the
pseudonym of poet Moshe Barzilai) noted the connection between Abdi’s works
and those of Käthe Kollwitz, and said that the works in the album speak in “a
clear language of non-acceptance of Palestinian fate […] The album is a single
totality despite the differences between its subjects. For the subject is but one:
identiication with the fate of the refugees, non�acceptance of this fate, and an
expression of hope and emotional turmoil” (A, Niv, 11 July 1973).
[8]
The prints in the portfolio were also reproduced in the Mifgash journal and Zu
Haderekh, together with cultural articles and Hebrew poetry and literary texts
(“Sleeping in the Desert”, for example, was reproduced in Zu Haderekh on 15
November 1972, and print no. 1 of the portfolio, the pen and ink drawing
“Weeping Woman” was reproduced in the same paper on 11 July 1973). The
presence of these drawings and prints in the bi-national cultural system of the
≤±¥
[9]
[4]
of the people. The igures of the anonymous refugees are drawn in ilament�like
lines that create a single body-mass-wave. United in one fate, barefooted, they
are shrouded in long robes. The man borne on their shoulders seems to emerge
from within them and his long arms are spread wide in either a blessing or an
attempt to maintain his balance. The entire mass of igures is surrounded by a
void, similar to the igures in other works in the portfolio (and similar to many
of Kollwitz’s works). The religious context of a redeeming messiah is somewhat
surprising in the work of a communist, Social Realism artist. But this messiah is a
man of the people, a man who has nothing, the chosen one who comes from the
people, spreads out his arms/protection over them, the man who is to lead them
to a better future. Compared with Ismail Shammout’s famous 1953 painting
“Where To?” (no. 4), in which the frightened refugee looks forward along the
road he treads in a barren geographical expanse, the refugee messiah in Abdi’s
work is looking with pride at the observer from the height of his elevated position.
Compared with another of Shammout’s works too, the 1954 “We Shall Return”
(no. 5), the proud igure of the refugee in Abdi’s work, drawn in bold black lines,
conveys resolve, not helplessness or fear.
However, Abdi too addressed the helplessness of the Palestinians and emphasizes
it in print no. 8, the charcoal drawing “Refugees in the Desert” (no. 6). In this
drawing the refugees are seen from afar as a human swarm, similar to the way in
which Grundig presented her refugees, but with Abdi they do not ill the entire
“frame” and it is impossible to discern their expressions. In his expressive drawing
the hundreds of unidentiiable refugees create a meandering road that vanishes
into the hills close to the horizon. High above the refugees stands the burning sun
that is drawn in several bold lines in a completely cloudless sky.
[5]
In the context of landlessness and loss of familial identity, the feminine presence
is particularly emphasized. In print no. 2, a pen and ink drawing of dense lines,
“Women” (no. 7), two women are seen, their heads covered, curled up in their
long dresses/cloaks, as they sit withdrawn into themselves facing one another.
The face of the woman sitting on the right of the drawing looks directly at the
observer with a sad and worried expression. Except for a low horizon and the
same burning sun, here too the background is devoid of character and the women
appear to be loating in the space of the paper.
Another picture of a woman refugee appears in print no. 1 of the portfolio, the
pen and ink drawing “Weeping Woman” (no. 8) in which in a close-up of her face
tears can be seen in her eyes in a composition reminiscent of Käthe Kollwitz’s
“The Widow” (1922-23) (no. 9).
[6]
The sense of tragedy and loneliness is expressed differently in print no. 8, the
pen and ink drawing “Sleeping in the Desert” (no. 10), in which two igures,
≤±µ
lives. I was brought up according to this approach and thus I
understand the connection between my artistic work and the
role deined by Kokoschka, who sought to remove the mask
for all those who want to see reality as it is. The role of ine art
is to show them the truth (A. Niv, Zu Haderekh, 13.2.1974).
Speaking about his art and the 1973 War, Abdi said:
Out of my worldview and my loathing of war, and also out
of my profound concern for the future of relations between
the two peoples, Arab and Jewish, I have shown my two works
here in the exhibition [entitled “Echoes of the Times” in
which artists from Haifa and the north of Israel participated].
When the cannons thundered on the Golan [Heights] and the
banks of the [Suez] Canal, and when the future of the region
was at risk, I recalled the words of Pablo Picasso and in my
work I said “no to war” in accordance with my artistic beliefs;
art must be committed and play a role (ibid.)
2. The Refugee Print Portfolio
In the years Abdi spent in Germany (1964-1971) he created a most impressive
corpus of illustrations, lithographs and etchings mainly dedicated to either the
Nakba or the Palestinian refugees. A group of the refugee works which Abdi
created in Germany between 1968 and 1971, and which was published in 1973
as a set of twelve black and white prints entitled “Abed Abdi – Paintings”, offers a
glimpse of central motifs that would later recur in many of his works. In these and
other works, clearly evident is the mark left by his childhood experiences when
he moved between refugee camps, and from the period following his family’s
reuniication in Haifa. To depict the refugees Abdi adopted a Social Realism
approach of the kind to which he was exposed prior to his departure for Germany,
and which he reined while he was there.
All the igures in the print portfolio are of refugees. In the pen and ink drawing,
“The Messiah Rises” (no. 1), no. 10 in the portfolio, the igure of a barefooted,
elderly, tall, bearded man is seen walking alone, behind it tumbledown huts or
houses with sloping roofs, and around its head are allusive rays. In another work
from the same period that is not included in the portfolio, “Refugee in a Tent”
(no. 2), the loneliness of the refugee is again emphasized. The etching presents
a close-up of a bearded, wrinkled face, a sad mouth and eyes, and a kind of
headdress that seems like a tent. In contrast with the loneliness of the elderly
refugee in the two previous works, Abdi places him in a social context in print
no. 4 of the portfolio, the lithograph “Revelation of the New Messiah” (no. 3).
Here Abdi depicts a human wave on whose crest is a man borne on the shoulders
≤±∂
[1]
[2]
[3]
after the establishment of the State of Israel. The military government period
imposed harsh isolation on those artists who remained within Israel’s borders.
The imposition of military government on the majority of Arab residential areas
by virtue of British Mandate emergency laws was intended to restrict, as it indeed
did, the freedom of expression, movement and organization of the Arab citizens.
It was therefore only after military government was revoked in 1966 that young
Palestinians began to study art in Israel and abroad. After Abdi’s return to Israel,
in the 1970s and 80s the artists Assad Azi (b. 1955, Shefa�A’mer), Ibrahim Nubani
(b. 1961, Acre), Asim Abu-Shakra (b. 1961, Umm el-Fahem), and Osama Said (b.
1957, Nahaf) went to study art, and their work relects the unique culture of the
Palestinian minority in Israel.9
Social Realism in Israel
Before his departure for Germany and on his return Abdi worked together with
others identiied as “Social Realism” artists in Israel who in the 1950s and 60s
came together in “Red” Haifa, the ethnically mixed city with its large workers
population.10 These artists engaged in every facet of Israeli reality out of a
profound identiication with its deprived and discriminated against sections. They
sought to create art with social messages that would be understood by and be
accessible to “the masses”, and thus they created artistic prints that were both
affordable and which conveyed their message. Gershon Knispel was the driving
force behind the Haifa Social Realism artists’ circle, whose ranks included Alex
Levi and Shmuel Hilsberg, and maintained contact with artists who created in
this style and resided in other locations in Israel, such as Avraham Ofek, Ruth
Schluss, Shimon Zabar and Naftali Bezem.
Commitment to this global idea and worldview is also clearly evident in Abdi’s
words at a panel discussion11 held in 1973 by the Haifa Association of Painters
and Sculptors at Chagall House, under the title “Artists in the Wake of Events”:
In the same way that an artist lives the events of the past,
present and future, he also lives the conlict between Man
and the forces of evil and destruction. And when society and
humankind are in crisis, the artist is required to express
himself harmoniously by means of the artistic vehicle at
his disposal […] and so […] the role of the artist in his
work, thoughts and worldview is to reinforce the perpetual
connection between himself and the society in which he
See Tal Ben Zvi, Hanna Farah (eds.), 2009. Men in the Sun, Herzliya Museum of Contemporary
Art.
10 Balas, 1998:8.
11 In addition to Abdi, also participating in this panel were the artists Avshalom Okashi and Ger-shon Knispel, art critic Zvi Raphael and architect Haim Tibon.
9
≤±∑
through art. He served as the irst head of the PLO’s Art Education Department
immediately after the organization was founded in 1964, and his book Art in
Palestine (Kuwait, 1989) was the irst publication on Palestinian art and its history.
For these and other reasons the role he played was of particular importance
for both the establishment of the ield of Palestinian art and the formulation of
modes of representation of the Nakba, which were also disseminated in the works
of other artists in the Palestinian diaspora, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip
from the 1950s to Shammout’s death in 2006. Furthermore, many of his works
were reproduced and widely disseminated in posters, postcards and calendars.
Shammout’s inluence on Abdi’s work is of particular importance in all matters
regarding the image of Palestinian refugees.
Abdi attests to the mutual inluence and reciprocal artistic relations in the 1970s
and 80s with Palestinian artists of his own generation from the West Bank and the
Gaza Strip who acquired their education at art schools in the Arab world (mainly in
Cairo, Alexandria and Baghdad), among whom are Nabil Anani (b. 1943, Emmaus),
Taysir Barakat (b. 1959, in a Gaza refugee camp), Ibrahim Saba (b. 1941, Ramla),
Issam Bader (b. 1948, Hebron), Vera Tamari (b. 1945, Jerusalem), Tahani Skeik (b.
1955, Gaza), Taleb Dweik (b. 1952, Jerusalem), Kamal Moghani (b. 1944, Gaza),
Fathi Gaben (b. 1947, Gaza), and others. The most notable is Suleiman Mansour
(b. 1947, Bir Zeit) who, in contrast with the abovementioned group, studied at
the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem for one year (1969-1970).
Abdi also became very familiar with the work of artists active in the Palestinian
diaspora who engaged in the pure symbolism of “Palestinian suffering”. Among
the notable refugee camp artists are Naji al-Ali (b. 1936 in the Galilee and grew
up in a Lebanese refugee camp) who worked in Lebanon and London,8 Ibrahim
Hazima (b. 1933 in Acre and grew up in Latakia, Syria) who won an art scholarship
in East Germany and later continued to work in Europe, Tamam al�Akhal (b. 1935,
Jaffa) who studied art in Alexandria and Cairo, married Ismail Shammout and
worked in Beirut from where she moved to Jordan, and Kamal Boullata (b. 1942,
Jerusalem) who studied art in Rome and Washington and on completing his studies
in 1968 remained in the United States where he wrote the history of Palestinian art
in a large number of books, catalogues and articles.
In the context of Palestinian art in Israel it is worthy of note that as a result
of the Palestinian Nakba and life under military government, Palestinian artists
became active within Israel’s borders only at a relatively late stage, some 25 years
8
Naji al-Ali worked as an illustrator for newspapers in Lebanon and the Gulf States between
1957 and 1983. In 1983, when walking to his newspaper’s London ofice, he was wounded in
a drive-by shooting and died a month later. The Intifada in the West Bank broke out that same
month.
≤±∏
Following her husband’s liberation from the camps, in 1947 Grunding joined
him in Soviet-occupied Dresden, which in 1949 became part of the German
Democratic Republic (GDR), where she became an important and respected
artist and lecturer at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts, whereas in Israel she
was almost completely forgotten.
The encounter between Abed Abdi, a twenty-two year-old Palestinian recently
arrived from Israel, and Lea Grundig, his teacher at the print and etching
department at the Dresden Academy, was of great signiicance for him.6 Their
relationship went far beyond the usual student�teacher format; Grundig opened
her home to him and was his social and cultural mentor for most of the time he
spent in the GDR.
It is, however, important to emphasize that this somewhat surprising encounter
between a young Arab victim of the Nakba and the Jewish Holocaust survivor Lea
Grundig was marked by their political and experiential common denominator,
their commitment to social and political justice, their protest against war and the
heavy toll it exacts from humankind. It was not, therefore, inluence derived from
a Jewish cultural or historical context, but rather one of a communist cultural
and philosophical context. It was actually their communist, cosmopolitical and
a-national identity that enabled their encounter and friendship, and their great
mutual admiration.
Palestinian Art in the Palestinian Diaspora, the West Bank and Gaza Strip
One of the most prominent characteristics seen in a perfunctory review of the
various branches of Palestinian art is the important role played by printing as
a vehicle for disseminating the messages that this art seeks to advance. In the
context of the art of print, clearly evident is the inluence of Ismail Shammout
(1930�2006), one of the irst Palestinian artists. After his expulsion from Lod in
1948, Shammout reached a Gaza refugee camp after a long and arduous journey
through Jordan, and in 1956 moved on to Beirut. He left Beirut for Kuwait after
the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, spent several years in Germany, and died in
Amman in 2006. Shammout’s life embodies the ordeal of the Palestinian odyssey.
Moreover, since he deined himself irst as a Palestinian and a political man, and
only second as an artist,7 Shammout took upon himself the mission of a witness
whose role it was to tell the world and its future generations the story of his people
6
7
In one of my conversations with him, the artist noted that his relationship with Lea Grundig
was founded on the sensitivity she displayed towards war and injustice, and inter alia due to her
belonging to the Jewish minority that had suffered so greatly during the Nazi era (conversation
with Abed Abdi, 19 March 2007).
See Paula Stern, “Portrait of the Artist (Palestinian) as a Political Man” at http://www.aliciapat�terson.org/APF0001970/Stern/Stern11/Stern11.html
≤±π
Germany. Following the Nazis’ rise to power, Kollwitz was forced to resign from
the Academy of Fine Arts, her works were declared “decadent art” and were
removed from public exhibitions. She spent most of the war years in Berlin but
in 1943 was evacuated to Dresden where she died on 22 April 1945, two weeks
before Nazi Germany’s capitulation.
Abed Abdi was well acquainted with Kollwitz’s work before he left for Germany.
In the 1950s they had been printed in Israel in art journals such as Mifgash, and
communist newspapers like Kol Ha’am, Zu Haderekh and Al-Ittihad. Abdi’s friends
and colleagues, such as Ruth Schluss, Yohanan Simon, Moshe Gat and Gershon
Knispel, all diligently studied Kollwitz’s work.4 Her drawings, prints and etchings
inluenced generations of socio�politically conscious artists sensitive to human
suffering both inside and outside Germany.
Whereas Abdi became acquainted with Kollwitz’s work mainly through
reproductions, the inluence of Lea Grundig on his work was more direct. Grundig
had known Käthe Kollwitz, and in many respects continued her tradition into
the 1960s. But in addition to underscoring the suffering of the working class,
Grundig’s work was marked by the horrors of World War II, and the iconography
she created focuses on issues such as refugeeism, expulsion, survivors and so forth,
issues that in the twentieth century had become identiied with that war. The
profound inluence of Grundig’s works is clearly evident in Abdi’s development
as an artist during his studies and in the iconographic shaping of refugeeism in
general, and the Nakba iconography in particular, in his work.
Lea Grundig (née Langer) was born in Dresden in 1906 and died during a
trip to the Mediterranean countries in 1977.She studied with Otto Dix at the
Dresden Academy of Fine Arts, married the painter Hans Grundig, and the two
became active members of the German Communist Party (KPD) in Dresden.
Following the Nazis’ rise to power, Lea and Hans Grunding were persecuted,
detained for questioning, and were even arrested on several occasions. In 1939,
a short time before her husband was sent to a concentration camp, Lea inally
left Germany and reached Palestine aboard the refugee vessel, the S.S. Patria, in
1940. In 1944 she exhibited her “Valley of the Dead” cycle (1943) that directly
addressed the events of the Holocaust: refugeeism, expulsion, freight wagons,
executions, concentration camps, and so forth. The Israeli artistic establishment
was unsympathetic towards “Valley of the Dead” and Lea Grundig, who was in
Palestine during World War II, had dificulty in understanding how the country’s
Jewish artists could ignore the Holocaust.5
4
5
Balas, Gila, 1998. “The Artists and Their Works”, Social Realism in the 1950s, Haifa Museum of
Art, pp. 15�32.
Amishai�Maisels, Ziva, 1993. Depiction and Interpretation: The Inluence of the Holocaust on the Visual
Arts, Oxford, Pergamon Press, p. 382.
≤≤∞
some of them were also published on occasion in Al-Ittihad, Al-Jadid, and in poster
form. In the 1970s and 80s he also did illustrations for the texts of Palestinian
and Israeli writers and poets. In 1978, two years after the Land Day events in
Sakhnin, together with Gershon Knispel he created and erected the monument
commemorating Land Day. Later, Abdi also created monuments in Shfaram,
Kafr Kana and Kafr Manda.
Over the years Abdi worked as an art teacher in Kafr Yasif, and since 1985 has
served as an art lecturer at the Arab College of Education in Haifa. During the
years he served as the graphic editor of Al-Ittihad and Al-Jadid (1972-1982), many
of his illustrations appeared in those papers, in journals and books, and also in
numerous political posters including those marking Land Day, posters marking
the Kafr Qassem massacre, and Israeli Communist Party election posters.
Dresden, the Formative Period: Artistic-Ideological Inluences
Clearly identiiable in Abdi’s works from the seven years he spent in Dresden,
are traces of a consistent artistic and subject matter trend that focused on igures
of refugees and were done in a Social Realism style using artistic graphic means
such as drawings, stone prints and etchings accompanied by political and literary
texts dealing with justice and morality. To a great extent this trend was inluenced
by the sociopolitical worldview adopted by Abdi in his youth when he joined the
Communist Party, but it was also mediated by the artists of the Social Realism
school in Israeli art. These trends, however, matured in Dresden, inspired by
the works of two women artists: the printmaker, painter and sculptress Käthe
Kollwitz and painter and print artist Lea Grundig.
Käthe Kollwitz (1867�1945) devoted her work to creating empathic descriptions
of universal suffering resulting from a life experience of distress, exploitation and
discrimination, and from revolutionary or traumatic historical events, and she had
irsthand knowledge of a life of suffering, poverty and hunger: after her marriage
to Dr, Karl Kollwitz (1891) the couple moved to a poor neighborhood in Berlin
and it was this environment that provided her with the materials that fortiied her
political consciousness and nourished her work until her death.3 Her most famous
works include the “Weavers’ Revolt” cycle (1893-1897), which is based on a play
by Gerhardt Hauptmann that describes the Silesian weavers’ revolt in 1844;
the “Peasant War” cycle (1901-1908) that is dedicated to the peasants’ revolt in
southern Germany in the second half of the 16th century; the “Grieving Parents”
memorial (1914�1932); and the numerous lealets she designed for Internationale
Arbeitshilfe (IAH) from 1920 onward. In the Weimar Republic Kollwitz enjoyed
canonical status and her works were studied and disseminated throughout
3
See Martha Kearns, Käthe Kollwitz: Woman and Artist, New York, Feminist Press, 1976: 69.
≤≤±
1. The Trailblazer: Abed Abdi
Biographical Milestones
Abed Abdi was born in 1942 in the church quarter of downtown Haifa. In April
1948, he, his mother, his brothers and sisters were uprooted from their home,
while his father remained in Haifa. From Haifa the mother and her children
traveled to Acre from where, two weeks later, they sailed on a decrepit boat to
Lebanon. In Lebanon they were irst housed in the “quarantine” transit camp in
Beirut port, and later moved to the Miya Miya refugee camp near Sidon, from
where they continued to Damascus. After three years of wandering between
refugee camps, the mother and her children were allowed back into Israel as part
of the family reuniication program.
In his youth Abdi joined the Communist Youth Alliance in Haifa, where
he also began his artistic journey. In this environment he was irst exposed to
Social Realism and Israeli artists who adopted this style and who, at the time,
were close to the Israeli socialist-communist Left. In 1962 Abdi was accepted for
membership in the Haifa Association of Painters and Sculptors, becoming its irst
Arab member, and also held his irst exhibition in Tel Aviv. In 1964 he was sent by
the Haifa branch of the Israeli Communist Party to study graphic design, mural
art, environmental sculpture and art in Dresden in the German Democratic
Republic. Abdi lived in Germany for seven years, completed his masters degree in
arts and a year of specialization. At the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts graphics
and printing department he met the woman who was to become his teacher and
most important source of inspiration, the Jewish artist Lea Grundig, who had
gained a reputation for her protest works against fascism and Nazism. During
those years Abdi was also inluenced by German artists such as Gerhard Kattner
and Gerhard Holbeck.
He returned to Haifa in 1971, and in November 1972, the city awarded Abdi
the Herman Struck Prize2 and to mark the occasion he held an exhibition of
his works at the city’s Beit Hageffen Gallery. In 1973 the works shown in this
exhibition were printed and published in a portfolio, and in the following years
2
A. Niv noted the Hebrew dailies’ ignoring Abdi being awarded the prize: “The irst Arab artist
to win the prize in his homeland, the Herman Struck Prize” (A. Niv, Zu Haderekh, 11 July 1973).
≤≤≤
Ta l B e n Z v i
Abed Abdi: “Wa Ma Nasina” (We Have Not Forgotten)
Palestinian art created within Israel’s 1948 borders possesses unique characteristics
deriving from its being part of the visual culture of the Palestinian minority
in Israel. In this artistic-national construct, the artist, graphic designer and
printmaker Abed Abdi played a leading role as a consequence of his work over
the decade between 1972 and 1982 as graphics editor of the publications of the
Communist and Democratic Front for Peace and Equality parties, the Arabic
language journal Al-Ittihad and the Al-Jadid literary journal. Additionally, many of
his works were also published in the Communist Party’s Hebrew language paper,
Zu Haderekh and in a variety of election and other posters for the Communist Party
and the Democratic Front. The fact that Abdi often reused images he created in
various contexts also reinforced the iconic status of many of his works.
The present article will focus on two subjects that play a signiicant role in shaping
the visual culture and collective memory of the Palestinian minority in Israel.
First, “the art of print”, a term I employ to deine the presentational space and
practice of works of art printed in relatively large editions in the press, books,
booklets, posters and postcards. Although these works are often accompanied by
political, journalistic, literary and poetical texts, they are not illustrations per se but
rather visual texts that are often of equal status to verbal ones. By means of this
space and practice, the reproduced works gradually establish the visual culture of
their target audience. Hence, they are an autonomous alternative presentational
space and practice of works of art that played a most important role in shaping
the national culture of all sections of the Palestinian people.
The second subject is the planning and erection of the “Land Day” monument
in Sakhnin in 1976-1978, and its attendant preliminary sketches done together
with the artist Gershon Knispel.1 This monument, which is identiied as one of
the turning points in the Palestinian presence in the public arena inside Israel,
became a particularly signiicant and inluential factor in everything pertaining
to the formation of the national collective memory in general, and the visual
memory in particular, of the Palestinian minority in Israel.
1
The Sakhnin monument stood at the center of the “The Story of a Monument: Land Day
in Sakhnin” exhibition (curator, Tal Ben�Zvi). For further reading on the exhibition see, Gish,
Amit, “You Will Build and We Shall Destroy: Art as a Rescue Excavation”, Sedek 2, 2008, pp.
117�119, the exhibition website: www.hagar-gallery.com, and the exhibition catalogue: Tal
Ben�Zvi, Shadi Halilieh, Jafar Farah (eds.), 2008, Land Day: The History, Struggle and Monument,
Mossawa Center, Haifa [Arabic].
≤≤≥