Syria speaks: Art from the frontline

An alternative revolution is taking place in Syria, while the three-year long conflict between rebel forces and President Bashar al-Assad rages on. Its weapons are not sectarian violence or chemical warfare but spray paint, cameras, pen, ink and digital illustration. For Syrian artists, filmmakers and writers, creativity has become the first line of defence against violence and tyranny.

Since the civil war began in 2011, there has been an outpouring of art and expression across all levels of Syrian society, from small towns to its war-battered second city Aleppo. This work challenges the increasing violence on all sides, which has left more than 162,000 people dead and nearly half the country’s population displaced.

A new generation of underground Syrian dissident artists, writers and thinkers has emerged—a movement that is gaining international recognition for its aesthetics of resistance. The British Museum recently announced the creation of a new archive of Syrian art at a discussion entitled "Behind the Headlines: A Revolution in Syrian Art." And this month, graffiti stencils of Syrian martyrs will be included in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s exhibition Disobedient Objects, a history of protest through objects.

“The artistic response” to the Syrian conflict, as my collaborator Zaher Omareen and I wrote in the introduction to our new book Syria Speaks, “is far more than a litany of turmoil; it illustrates the accelerated experiences of a people, many of whom have been fighting for their survival. It shows their innate ability to overcome, and their dreams for the future of their country.”

Five works from this new creative frontline appear below:

Across Syria, citizen photographers have been risking their lives in order to document their country’s destruction, posting their findings on Facebook. The online group is known as Lens Young, with sub sections named after a city, its inhabitants or some other moniker. For example Lens Young Homsi, Lens Young Dimashqi [Damascus] and Lens Young Idlib, are made up of young men and women, some of whom are teenagers. They use whatever photographic equipment is at their disposal, from mobile phones to DSLR cameras, to cover the war. While some of the images have documentary value, their photographs also capture the artistic side of the conflict in grainy black and white. This poignant photograph, Lovers by Deaa from Len Young Homsi, was captured in the rubble of Homs.

At a time when many Syrian artists have been working in anonymous collectives to support the uprising, the Facebook page Art & Freedom takes a more direct and, for some, a more dangerous approach. Started by the veteran Syrian painter and activist, Youssef Abdelki, it encourages artists to sign their names to the paintings, drawings, sculpture and digital illustrations that feature on the page. Doing so is an act of solidarity with the victims of the uprising, and has not been without consequences. Some artists have been forced to flee the country while others have been arrested and detained. Yasmeen Fanari (b. Damascus, 1981) is an animator and artist who now lives in Paris, her work Vomit is among the featured pieces on the Art & Freedom page. Her short film Shabab Souri received an award for young talent at the 2008 Damascus Capital of Arab Culture festival.

Street art is a high risk endeavour in most places, but in Syria graffiti artists caught in the act by the country’s security services often pay with their lives. As a result, activists have created a secret toolkit for spray-painting political slogans such as “Your bullets killed only our fear” and “Down with the tyrant”. It includes, among other things, a stencil cut out of the bottom of a carrier bag that can be placed anywhere, sprayed quickly and abandoned. Another stencil, hidden within the pages of a newspaper as a sheet, can be whipped out at a moment’s noticed and sprayed. These works formed the basis for the 2012 international campaign Freedom Graffiti Week Syria, part of the international Freedom Graffiti Week. Exhibits took place on walls across Syrian cities, as well as those in Beirut, Cairo, Ramallah and San Francisco.

A rising star of the Syrian art scene, Khalil Younes creates work that both reflects the revolution and has the lasting appeal of Goya’s paintings and prints of Napoleon’s war with Spain, which challenged artistic depictions of war as heroic. Younes’ series of pen and ink drawings Revolution 2011 is a work in progress. The emotionally powerful portraits of some of the key figures of the uprising have been extensively reproduced across the Internet. Hamza Bakkour has been made into spray paint stencils used by Syrian activists inside the country. Younes also writes short stories and is prolific on social media.

The powerful digital illustrations by Sulafa Hijazi (b. Damascus, 1977) in her series Ongoing started when her family and friends were arrested by the Assad regime in 2011. An animator and filmmaker, she uses the technology and techniques of digital illustration, a medium that was easy to hide in the computer in case there was a knock by the mukhabarat, or secret police, at her door. Hijazi’s artist’s statement accompanying her illustrations in Syria Speaks is essentially a feminist argument against the patriarchy of war. She also critiques her country’s militarised society. Like all Syrians of her generation, she underwent military training in secondary school, where she learned to handle small arms. The practice was stopped by the government in the mid 2000s.

Syria Speaks is published by Saqi Books, 2014 and has a Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Syria-Speaks-Art-and-Culture-from-the-Frontline/675326635875887