Lindsay Knox

We visited an exhibition at the Emirates Palace held by Rowaq al Balqa Foundation for Arts, where we met the artist Khaldoun who showed us a variety of work including his own. There was a variety of figurative and semi abstract work in all shapes and sizes. We were then invited to create a piece of our own with his influence. We each did a separate piece, which we then put together in groups to create a larger piece. Some of us didn't like our individual pieces; however, put together in groups they created a new approach. We were asked to describe our collective piece...

The contrast between spiritual Islamic art and culture and modern abstract expressionism is very fluent and expressive. The black lines represent the modern skyline of the UAE mixed with the green "spikiness" of the texture could represent palm trees, a large feature of the UAE. The positioning of Arabic lettering on both sides of the piece helped represent the historical and cultural element that we live in. The Arabic word on the right meaning "GOD" contrasts well with the pieces. The sun-like feature at the top helps portray god and the circle features were said by Khaldoun to be very "Islamic". The style in which it was painted was fairly free yet limited as it was done with our fingers - however there were abrupt stops and changes of materials. It was a useful, different and enjoyable experience, but felt that more time would have enabled us to develop the pieces more to our satisfaction.