The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

Located on the outskirts of Cairo in the upscale mall Designopolis, Tache Art Gallery opened its doors on January 23rd
with an exhibition showcasing twenty years of work by Huda Lutfi, renowned Egyptian artist
and professor.

Lutfi’s work is diverse,
revealing an artist who is playful as she is meditative, feminine as she is
rebellious, covering a range of issues that are personal as they are universal.
Whereas many works are part of a series, scattered standalone pieces are also
featured.

Lutfi challenges socialised notions
of masculinity in her ‘Issues of Masculinity’ while revealing the struggle to
speak as a woman in a male-dominated society in ‘The Doll Series.’ Her passion
for history bleeds through the pieces, creating layers of Ancient Egyptian,
Roman and Greek mythology in the layers of paint. Coptic and Islamic influences
are also notable in The Coptic Dancer
and the geometric reproductions of ‘The Alef Series’ and ‘Fragments of Street
Life.’

Lutfi’s preferred method is
acrylic on paper, but her integration of materials like sand, leather,
b-lights, discarded bottles and other found objects brings the earthy quality
of the city to her works. The usage of discarded materials and pieces of
popular culture like product labels bring depth and humour to Lutfi’s collaged
pieces.

In the series ‘Fragments of
Street Life,’ Lutfi reproduces street scenes familiar to anyone who has strolled
through Downtown Cairo, creating matrices of relationships in the mathematical
reproductions of prototypes.

‘The Meditative Pieces’ and ‘The
Dawn Series’ capture the artist’s reflections on self and spirituality,
punctuating the dynamism of the exhibition with select moments of stillness.
Her affiliation to a culture of writing and learning is apparent in all of her
pieces with the frequent use of text and calligraphy. In ‘The Alef Movement,’ Lutfi
explores the forms of the Arabic alphabet with contained reproductions of the
written letters.

Not Titled Yet features cut-outs of US President Obama’s face on the
statues of liberty in recycled glass bottles; whereas the Kuffeya reproduces the Palestinian kuffeya on plaster moulds,
revealing a political dimension of the artist as well.

Pieces on exhibit are priced
between 3000LE to 180,000LE and range from small to large sizes. With twenty years
of work, the recurrent influences of the artist and the threads that run
through the different periods make this a dynamic exhibition.