 The Artist: Kamal Boullata was born in 1942 in Jerusalem where he grew up. He graduated from the Rome Fine Arts Academy and from the Corcoran Museum Art School. In 1993 and 1994, he was the recipient of a Fulbright Senior Scholar Fellowship to conduct research on Islamic art in Morocco. Among the public collections containing Boullata’s art are the Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris, The British Museum, London, Jordan National Gallery of Fine Arts, Amman, Patronato de la Alhambra, Granada, New York Public Library, New York, A.H. Shoman Foundation, Amman, A.M. Qattan Foundation, London, UNESCO, Paris, World Bank, Washington, DC, Pyramid Atlantic, Riverdale, MD Gulf Cooperation Council, Riyadh. The United States, Kuwait, Holland, and Canada, as well as in the UK, Morocco, and Jerusalem. Boullata participated in the French Palestinian spring exhibit at the Paris Institut du Monde Arabe, and wrote the exhibit's catalogue. In 1998, he held an exhibit at the Sakakini of the “Granada Portfolio”, which he donated to the Center. Boullata’s writing on art has appeared in periodicals, exhibition catalogs and encyclopedias. Periodicals include Muslim World, Mundus Artium, Third Text, Journal of Palestine Studies, Encyclopedia of the Palestinians (2000). Anthologies he edited in English include “Women of the Fertile Crescent: An Anthology of Modern Poetry by Arab Women” (1978), and “The World of Rashid Hussein: A Palestinian Poet in Exile” (1979). He is the author of “Faithful Witnesses: Palestinian Children Recreate their World” (1990) (Arabic, English, French) and “Recovery of Place: A Study of Contemporary Palestinian Painting: 1847-1997” (2001) (Arabic). Artists books he authored include: “Beginnings” (1992), “Three Quartets” (1994), “A Cloak of Clouds” (1995), “Twelve Lanterns for Granada” (1996), and “The Beatitudes” (1998). Boullata is a member of the Sakakini General Assembly. At present, he lives and works in Southern France. His work: Boullata works mainly in silk screen. His compositions are based on the angular Kufi script, which he uses as a representational form of art. In a review of his work, Moroccan art critic Abdelkebir Khatibi wrote: “Elaborated with remarkable continuity and patience, Boullata's work is that of a surveyor, an artist of proportion and measurement. Behind this passion for geometry lies the tradition of icon-painting, which forged the beginnings of his artistic training, a tradition that has maintained a venerable continuity between Byzantium and the Arabo-Islamic civilization of the Middle East.” |
 |
 |
 |
|