TWO worlds of self meditation came together, displayed in the form of plastic arts during the first dual exhibition by artists Wafa' Al-Yareemi and Taghreed Al-Jed'ani, which was launched on Saturday at the House of Plastic Artists in Al Jamjoom Commercial Center. Al-Yareemi's meditations have been represented in 17 works, which mostly reveal spiritual and religious images of the Grand Mosque, Al Ka'bah, and the Prophet's Mosque. However, Al-Jed'ani's 21 paintings all depict scenes of nature embodied in different kinds of roses and flora. Abdullah Bahattab, director of the Saudi Association of Culture and Arts commented on Al-Yareemi's canvases that have an overwhelming blueness, characterized by a kind of audacity in using this color along with black over ample spaces. “In fact, the skirmish between these two dark colors has successfully divulged the artist's iconography and spiritual allegories,” Bahattab expounded. On the other side of the gallery, Bahttab pointed out the boldness of the brighter colors -- especially yellow. “I think it is a very new visual experience crafted by Al-Jed'ani, to let the spectator encounter different kinds of roses and flowers from assorted areas around the world,” Bahattab said. “There are six committees in our association that constantly encourage Saudi artists to be more active in different art forms, including plastic arts, ceramic , folklore, music, photography and calligraphy. Nonetheless, the art of music is still rather nascent in the Kingdom and needs more support, ” Bahattab said. Taghreed's remarked on her work,”I intentionally unleashed a free style in using my paintbrush to symbolize the images of flora and roses, without any vivid figuration unlike my other work. I tried to spread the pigments of natural scenes by a free hit of the brush to avoid the clichéd characterizing. I also managed to make the purity of saturation of the yellow hue from bright (pure) to dull, mixed with other neutral colors like green and red,” she elaborated. Al-Yareemi described her works as messages conveying personal experience and religious contemplations. “I picked the blueness because it is the color of the clear blue sky, which in turn represents the affinity of the mind and spirit. The harmony between the blue and black symbolize the peak of the heavenly temperament when a person facing Al –Ka'bah with its majestic black curtain under the clearness of the blue sky.” The best painting according to Al-Yareemi is the one tagged “La Malja'a Ella Elaik” (No Sanctum or Recourse except to Allah) depicting the image of the Holy Ka'aba on two separate canvases. __
