Some time (years) ago I was thinking about taking some photos of Egypt and writing comments: a lot of photos and short comments.
I tried to do it myself, but it did not work. I am simply not a photographer.
Once I told Elly when she was in Egypt about my idea; at the time I was in Amsterdam and she sent me some photos she had shot, and I liked them. However, I thought that photos in black and white were more impressive, with the advance of technology they have disappeared even from Egypt!
Elly published some of her photos in Madny. They are from Alexandria, a city I like more than Cairo, because of its cosmopolitanism and the sea.
It is the city where I went after getting my freedom from the desert prison in Wahat Gargha. So you can imagine after more than two years in the desert how I felt!
This Girl from Alex I had put her yesterday in my msn photo. She is haunting me with her uncertain smile, and what she tries to hide in her eyes.
My old ideas was: "Egyptians: birth, life and death"
So! Now I have done it!!
At least part from it. A thousand miles begins with one step.
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
el bent el Eskandraniea
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
Domenichino, and the lesser orientalist painter, Vernet
Left is Judah and Tamar by Horace Vernet 1789-1863, below is The Persian Sibyl by Domenico Zampieri, 1581-1641 
Today I visited the Wallace collection with Claire. Strangely I had never heard of this London gallery before and it took a girl from Wigan Pier to drag me there. It is an extraordinary place - a national Museum in a grand, historic town house, five minutes from the crushing banality of Oxford street and stupifying Selfridges. On first entering the gates we came upon a bucolic scene (without the sheep): London workers sprawled in the sun, all over the brilliantly green lawn eating their lunch-time sandwiches. We ventured on, wandering inside, into the cool, dark interior that smelt faintly of mince pies, then sharp left through the brilliantly lit gift shop and beyond was a medieval room full of armour. I protested I wasn't interested in armour. Then I looked at it and found it a wondrous and absurd thing. Claire, a Fashion Marketing lecturer, coveted a breastplate, whilst rejecting the chain-mail pants. I considered how likely you were to die horribly in battle anyway. Then we found the great orientalist painting collection and I almost fell in a swoon, forgetting my Edward Said lessons and abandoning myself to the rich exoticism. I think I am obsessed with the eroticism actually and felt a powerful draw to this painting, Judah and Tamar by the 19th century French painter, Horace Vernet. I want to be, simultaneously, Judah and Tamar. As we rushed out so Claire could catch her train, we passed before the great Persian Sibyl and I was mesmerised and abject before her lovely face.