Arts, Culture & Entertainment – Page 39 – Arabian Records (1st post : Eid Al Fitr – 01st Shawwal 1439 (AH) / 15th June 2018 ) / (BETA testing – Research

Monastery of St Paul: Unique Religious Heritage Site in Egypt’s Eastern Desert

Monastery has three churches, most important of which is underground Church of St Paul.

The Monastery of St Paul the Anchorite, also known as the Monastery of the Tigers, is a Coptic Orthodox monastery dating back to the 4^th Century CE located in Egypt’s Eastern Desert, near the Red Sea Mountains.

Located about 155 km south east of Cairo, the monastery gained the moniker the Monastery of the Tigers due to its isolated location out in the wilderness of Egypt’s desert moonscape. It covers an area of about five acres of land, and is a rectangular shape of 200 metres long by 100 metres wide.

By the 5^th Century CE, the monastery was built over the cave where St Paul the Anchorite lived for more than 80 years.

St Paul, also known as St Paul of Thebes, or Anba Bola in Arabic, was a Coptic Orthodox saint born in Alexandria in 228 CE. Following his father’s death, the teenage Paul decided to become a hermit and live a simple life.

At the age of 16, he converted to Christianity and escaped Alexandria to avoid Roman persecution. According to one story, God sent Paul an angel who guided him to Egypt’s arid Western Desert, where he could live alone as a hermit.

The same story relates how God sent Paul a crow every day carrying half a loaf of bread to feed him. One day St Anthony joined Paul, and when the crow came, it had a full loaf of bread. St Paul then realised that it was God who had sent St Anthony, after 80 years of his worshipping in solitude.

As legend tells it, when St Paul died St Anthony saw two lions standing by the door of the cave in which the former had made his home. The lions approached the corpse, and used their claws dug in the ground, for St Anthony put St Paul’s body into the hole for burial.

It is for this reason that St Paul’s icon in any Coptic museum in Egypt shows him flanked by two lions with a crown above his head.

The first travel narrative associated with the monastery belongs to an anonymous pilgrim from the Italian city of Piacenza who visited the tomb of St Paul the Anchorite between the years 560 CE and 570 CE. The pilgrim is not to be confused with Antoninus Martyr.

The first monks to occupy the monastery were some of the disciples of Anthony the Great, after they learned the story of St Paul the Anchorite. It may have been occupied by Melkites for a short period, although they were followed by Egyptian and Syrian monks.

The Syrians may have had a sustained existence at the monastery, for it appears that they also occupied the monastery during the first half of the 15th Century, after which their presence disappeared. According to an isolated Ethiopian reference, the 70th Coptic Orthodox Pope, Gabriel II (1131–45 CE), was banished to the monastery of St Paul the Anchorite for three years.

Throughout its history, the monastery has suffered from several Bedouin raids, the worst of which occurred in 1484. This particularly painful attack saw all the monks murdered and the monastery plundered, following which the Bedouins occupied the building for 80 years.

The monastery was rebuilt under the patronage of Pope Gabriel VII of Alexandria (1526-69 CE), then attacked and destroyed again towards the end of the century. The monastery was deserted for 119 years, then extensively reconstructed and repopulated by monks from St Anthony’s Monastery, under the patronage of Pope John XVI of Alexandria (1676-1718 CE).

The monastery has three churches, the most important of which is the underground Church of St Paul that contains the hermit’s cave and burial place. Its walls are painted with well-preserved frescoes, and the ceiling is hung with ostrich eggs, symbols of the resurrection. The larger Church of St Michael has a gilded icon of John the Baptist’s severed head.

There is no public transportation to St Paul’s Monastery and, as the original hermit intended, it is a long journey from civilisation to get there. Visitors can take the bus from Cairo to Hurghada and get off at the turn-off for St Paul’s Monastery, following which there is a 13 km uphill trek to the monastery itself. This may sound daunting at first, but the road is well-paved and has plenty of traffic.

The Monastery of St Paul is an incredibly important site in Egypt’s long and varied history, and is the second ancient Coptic Christian monastery tucked away in the Eastern Desert.

Visitors may also view some of the manuscripts in the monastery’s possession, which includes a Coptic language version of the “Divine Liturgy”. A tour of the site may include a trip up the tower, and a glimpse of the “Pool of Mary” where Mary, the sister of Moses, washed her feet during the Exodus.

Along with the nearby Monastery of St Anthony, the Monastery of St Paul is quite possibly the most impressive structure in the desert. It is for this reason that it is included in several Egyptian desert tours.

source/content: dailynewsegypt.com

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EGYPT

Saudia’a AlUla Design Award announce Winners for Inspired Product Designs : January 2022

The AlUla Design Award has announced the winners of its various categories for outstanding products inspired by AlUla.

The categories adjudicated at the Saudi Design Festival in Riyadh’s Jax district included jewelry, leather goods, footwear, homeware accessories, and other lifestyle products.

Over 400 applications were received, with shortlisted designs reviewed by a jury. The six best products were selected to receive the prestigious AlUla Design Award, including Harry Dobbs Design x Rukun, a collaboration between a British and Saudi design studio, which proposed a distinctive set of artifacts that capture AlUla’s spirit and memory.

The other five winners included Nour Shourbagy, a Saudi-based designer, who proposed a collection of travel carry-ons and clutches inspired by AlUla’s aesthetics and motifs.

Tarek Elkassouf, a Lebanese designer, now based in Australia, proposed a collection of gifts crafted by traditional artisans, while Mohamad Baalbaki x AlJoharah Al-Rasheed, a Saudi-based studio, put forward a collection of products evoking all five senses, with an interaction between play and memory.

Niko Kapa, a Greek designer based in Dubai, offered a collection of accessories inspired by the natural landscapes of AlUla, and Reem Bashawri, a Saudi-based designer, entered a line of luxurious winter shawls echoing the region’s natural beauty.

Prince Badr bin Abdullah bin Farhan, governor of the Royal Commission for AlUla, stated that the award was an important milestone in AlUla’s flourishing arts and cultural sector, to make AlUla a region for inspiration to all designers globally.

source/content: arabnews.com

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Winners and jury of AlUla Design Awards in Saudi Design Festival. (AN Photo/Saleh Al Ghannam)

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SAUDI ARABIA / LEBANESE / AUSTRALIAN

Egyptian Filmmaker Marianne Khoury Awarded France’s Legion of Honour : January 2022

Egyptian Producer and director Marianne Khoury was awarded France’s Legion of Honour in the degree of Chevalier (Knight).

The award was given to Khoury by the Ambassador of France to Egypt in Cairo Marc Baréty. The Legion of Honour is the highest French decoration and one of the most famous in the world. For two centuries, it has been presented on behalf of the Head of State to reward the most deserving citizens in all fields of activity.

It is highest French decoration, one of most famous in world.

Born in 1958, Khoury is a graduate of economics from both Cairo and Oxford Universities. She has directed and produced films on controversial issues such as identity, memory, and social exclusion. Khoury, who is the niece of late great Egyptian director Youssef Chahine, is a managing partner in prominent Cairo-based Misr International, one of Egypt’s production companies, which Chahine founded.

She is also a co-founder of the Panorama of The European Film. She directed her first documentary, ‘The Times of Laura’ in 1999. She then worked on ‘Women Who Loved Cinema’ in 2002 and ‘Shadows’, which tackles personal and social perceptions of the mentally ill.

Shadows premiered at the Opening of the Venice Film Festival in 2010 and won the FIPRESCI award at the Dubai Film Festival of the same year and the Italian television Rai Award in 2011 at the International Festival of Mediterranean Documentary and Current Affairs Films.

She also produced and directed ‘Let’s Talk’ in 2019, which received the Audience Award at the 41st Cairo International Film Festival. Very personal in character, the film is a conversation between her and her daughter about ordinary things in life: Death, life, illness, identity, marriage, etc.

source/content : dailynewsegypt.com

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EGYPT

Dubai Bags Record for World’s Largest Inflatable Water Park : January 2022

AquaFun, anchored in the Gulf waters alongside the JBR beach, has received a Guinness World Record certificate for being the world’s largest inflatable water park.

Launched for the first time in 2016, AquaFun has now expanded to three times its original size to reach 42,400 square metres. It currently forms the words ‘I love (heart symbol) Expo 2020 Dubai’, which can be seen from aircraft flying into Dubai.

It features over 72 obstacles and operates all year round. Prices start from Dh155 for an all-day pass ticket.

Ahmed Al Khaja, CEO of Dubai Festivals and Retail Establishment (DFRE), said: “To secure another world record for Dubai during such an important event in our calendar, the Dubai Shopping Festival, is a moment of real pride for the city.

Ahmed Ben Chaibah, CEO & Founder of AquaFun, said the aim with the project five years ago was to enrich the Dubai Marina and JBR areas’ offerings.

Emirate bagged yet another world record in the final week of its shopping festival.

source/content: khaleejtimes.com

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DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES (U.A.E)

‘Doum’, Moroccan Handbag Brand Founded by Samira and Yasmine Erguibi

Doum was founded by mother-daughter duo Samira Madrane and Yasmine Erguibi in 2017.

Samira and Yasmine Erguibi are the Moroccan mother-daughter duo who have made it their mission to make a positive impact in fashion. The designers are playing an active role in promoting sustainability and ethical practices with their accessories label, Doum.

Each design in their bag line is handmade by underprivileged women. The totes, clutches and pouches support fair trade and sustainable practices to preserve local artisanal traditions and invite local women from rural areas around Marrakech to provide for their families via the production of the bags, according to the label’s manifesto.

The brand takes its name from the Moroccan palm leaf, which is collected, pruned and then woven by the artisans. “It is a nod to our culture, heritage and craftsmanship,” explained Yasmine of the decision to name the label Doum.

Today, Doum operates its own cooperative in Morocco, Doum For Women, which currently employs 235 women artisans.

Doum For Women is the first basketry cooperative in Morocco to have obtained SEDEX certification, meaning that the organization ticks all of the boxes of ethical business practices.

source/content: arabnews.com

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MOROCCO

International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2021: Jordanian Writer Jalal Barjas named Winner

Jalal Barjas (aka) Jalal Barjes. Author. Writer. Poet. Novelist

Jordanian writer Jalal Barjas has won the International Prize for Arabic Fiction for his work Notebooks of the Bookseller.

The novel, published by The Arabic Institute for Research and Publishing, was named this year’s winner of the prize during an online ceremony.

Besides receiving a monetary prize of $50,000, Barjas will also be given funding towards securing an English translation of his novel.

Notebooks of the Bookseller is set in Jordan and Moscow between 1947 and 2019. It tells the story of Ibrahim, a bookseller and voracious reader, who loses his shop and finds himself homeless and diagnosed with schizophrenia. He begins to assume the identity of the protagonists of the novels he loved and commits a series of crimes, including burglary, theft and murder. He then attempts suicide before meeting a woman who changes his perspective on life.

Born in 1970, Barjas is a Jordanian poet and novelist who worked in the field of aeronautical engineering for several years. He is currently head of the Jordanian Narrative Laboratory and presents a radio programme called House of the Novel. He has also written articles for Jordanian newspapers and headed several other cultural organisations.

Barjas’s published work includes two poetry collections and four novels. His 2012 short story The Earthquakes won the Jordanian Rukus ibn Za’id ʻUzayzi Prize.

His 2013 novel Guillotine of the Dreamer won the Jordanian Rifqa Doudin Prize for Narrative Creativity in 2014. His Snakes of Hell won the 2015 Katara Prize for the Arabic Novel in the unpublished novel category, and was published by Katara in 2016. His third novel, Women of the Five Senses, was longlisted for the Ipaf in 2019.

Notebooks of the Bookseller was chosen by the Ipaf judges from a shortlist of six novels by authors from Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia.

The shortlisted works were all published between July 2019 and August 2020 and included The Eye of Hammurabi by Abdulatif Ould Abdullah, The Calamity of the Nobility by Amira Ghneim, The Bird Tattoo by Dunya Mikhail, File 42 by Abdelmajid Sabbath and Longing for the Woman Next Door by Habib Selmi.

The shortlisted authors will receive $10,000 each.

source/content: thenationalnews.com

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JORDAN

Arab Superstar Latifa El Arfaou to Lead Spotify’s First-Ever Female-Only Masterclass

Latifa Bint Alaya El Arfaou. Singer. Actress.

Music industry hopefuls, it’s time to update your calendar because Spotify is presenting its first-ever Sawtik female-only masterclass.

And Arab superstar and Godmother of Sawtik, Latifa Bint Alaya El Arfaoui, is set to host a special guest spot to share her story. The special installment, which supports the region’s emerging female artists as part of the Sawtik initiative.

The Tunisian superstar, who has partnered with the world’s most popular audio streaming service to be a mentor to exceptional up-and-coming talents from countries like UAE, KSA, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco, will be offering creators valuable tips and advice.

Latifa, who started her career in the 80s, told “Vogue Arabia.” “My journey hasn’t happened without its challenges and while I enjoy a successful career, there are many others still waiting for the right opportunity to shine.”

The singer and actress added Sawtik offers female artists an effective platform to reveal their talent and build a connection with audiences who will love their music across all genres.

Sawtik, which means “your voice” in Arabic, was launched as Spotify’s inaugural women-in-music initiative for the Middle East and North Africa region. The initiative, unveiled with 16 emerging talents including Almas, Jarra and Feluka, is also backed by other influential women in the music business. Introduced the same week that Apple launched its New Artists: Middle East playlist.

source/content: abouther.com

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TUNISIA

Sudanese Artist Mubarak Hemoudi Depicts the Heritage of Sudan From the U.S.

The Sudanese artist Mubarak Hemoudi, who is 77, works in the United States, but his paintings reflect his experiences in Sudan, including scenes of violence he witnessed in his youth and the daily suffering of residents, and especially women, of Sudan’s Darfur region.

Born in Sudan’s North Kordofan state in 1944, Hemoudi moved between the country’s southern and northern regions during his youth and now divides his time between the United States and Sudan. “I get inspired by images from Khartoum and come to America to paint,” he said.

Hemoudi recently displayed a series of his paintings in Northern Virginia in an exhibition titled “African Art and Tales from Sudan.”

Through 38 images of Darfuri women—some from the Baggara tribes in western Sudan, some from the Dinka tribes in the south and other groups—the exhibition takes visitors on a time journey to the past of Sudan’s rural regions.

Art as a Call for Freedom.

His art is influenced not only by the violence he witnessed during his youth and the tyranny of tribal leaders over peoples’ lives, but also by his experience of the patterns of daily life and interactions among the residents of Sudan’s various regions.

He explained that Sudanese art exists more in the natural environment than in urban areas such as Khartoum, which was influenced by imported European cubist and abstract art movements. All regions of Sudan are saturated with African art with an Arabic touch as a result of the first Arab immigration to Sudan’s western and northern regions, he said.

The Influence of Kushite Art

Hemoudi studied fine arts at the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Khartoum, which was established in the mid-1940s, before moving to Germany twice to study textile printing and color science. These skills later helped him improve his paintings’ aesthetics and master the use of lines.

In most of his works, Hemoudi draws on elements of Kushite art, one of the most famous types of African design and calligraphy used in drawings and decorations in many African countries.

The history of Kushite art goes back to Kush, a rich African civilization that originated in northern Sudan near the border with Egypt, nearly 5,000 years ago.

Kushite art is an art that stands on its own, Hemoudi said. “It is the origin of the existing arts and styles. It is hard to find an analogue of it in any other region,” he said. Its styles, he added, are characterized by a mix of simplicity, sophistication, and complexity.

The plastic arts in Sudan are a very old practice, according to Issam Abdel-Hafeez, a professor at the College of Fine and Applied Arts at Sudan University of Science and Technology.

“It was affected by the local scenery-rich environment, as well as the presence of Arab and African culture in its regions, which was reflected in the diversity of artists’ use of tools, such as the presence of fifty-one written languages other than Arabic,” Abdel-Hafeez said in a telephone interview.

source/content: al-fanarmedia.org

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SUDAN

Saudi Sculptor Husban El-Enizi spends 8 years Carving Words of Qur’an onto 30 Marble Slabs

Husban bin Ahmad El-Enizi. Sculptor.

A Saudi sculptor who spent eight years carving the words of the Holy Qur’an onto 30 marble slabs hopes his feat will be recognized by Guinness World Records.

Husban bin Ahmad Al-Enizi’s passion for the art started 20 years ago after he developed an interest in the Arabic language.

He went on to sculpt a stone encyclopedia of basmalah (the opening part of the Qur’an) on blocks and granite sourced from his base in the Tabuk region.

Al-Enizi used Ottoman calligraphy to create his Qur’an sculpture on green marble slabs and said that the Tabuk region, in northwestern Saudi Arabia, with its many castles and palaces, had inspired artists down through the centuries.

The region has been home to the Thamud, Aramean, and Nabataean people, among other tribes, and archaeological sites show human presence dating back several centuries B.C.

Ancient inhabitants of the area produced ploughs, boats, and even houses by carving in wood and stone and Al-Enizi noted that the Saudi government had helped to keep sculpting and other traditional arts and crafts alive through the establishment of the Heritage Commission.

source/content: arabnews.com

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Husban bin Ahmad Al-Enizi used Ottoman calligraphy to create his Qur’an sculpture on green marble slabs. (SPA)

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SAUDI ARABIA

Mounia Aram, Moroccan-French Animator Wins Cultural Innovator Award : January 2022

Moroccan-French animator Mounia Aram won the Cultural Innovator Award at the 2022 Black in Animation Awards Show.

The award testifies to Aram’s work in further developing animation media across the African continent while using experimental methods and concepts in her work to tell a unique story.

Aram received her award from a juried committee of professionals from Disney, Netflix, and Nickelodeon.

The Black in Animation Awards state “The Cultural Innovator Award is given to the person who has centered the voices of black people in animation in an innovative way as a content creator or influencer.”

Born in Casablanca and raised in France, Aram studied oriental languages at the National Institute for Oriental Languages and Civilizations (INALCO) in Paris before joining ShoPro Entertainment, a company specializing in Japanese animation-based in San Francisco.

The animation specialist founded the Mounia Aram Company in 2019, a distribution and production company specializing in animation and African culture. Aram has accumulated nearly 20 years of experience in the animation field.

Her work also consists of advising companies in their distribution and development strategies across the African continent as well as mentoring young African talents in animation.

In 2020, Aram was elected a member of the International Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in charge of the Emmy Awards. She also joined the Geena Davis Institute last year as Africa council chair.

source/content: moroccoworldnews.com

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FRENCH / MOROCCAN