Ibrahim Hassan Kheite (1930–1984), also known as Ibrahim Ghannam, was a

Palestinian Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...

visual artist and painter. Born in the coastal town of Yajur near

Haifa Haifa ( he, חֵיפָה ' ; ar, حَيْفَا ') is the third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropol ...

in Palestine, he lived in Tal Al-Za'atar refugee camp, north of

Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint o ...

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...

Biography

Ghannam contracted

Gout Gout ( ) is a form of inflammatory arthritis characterized by recurrent attacks of a red, tender, hot and swollen joint, caused by deposition of monosodium urate monohydrate crystals. Pain typically comes on rapidly, reaching maximal intens ...

as a child and used a wheelchair throughout his life.

Gannit Ankori Gannit Ankori (Hebrew: גנית אנקורי) is an Israeli art historian. She is Professor of Fine Arts and Chair in Israeli Art at the Department of Fine Arts at Brandeis University. She was previously chair of the Department of Art History at ...

, ''Palestinian Art'', Reaktion Books, 2006, p. 54. Thanks to a

UNWRA The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is a UN agency that supports the relief and human development of Palestinian refugees. UNRWA's mandate encompasses Palestinians displaced by the 1948 P ...

nurse providing him with painting materials, Ghannam was able to continue painting. Ghannam depicted scenes of village life in Yajur, in a naïve style using bright colours and a meticulousness approach to detail reminiscent of the Islamic minaturists. Ghannam's choice to paint evocative village life, a far cry from his room overlooking an open sewer, and his subsistence diet of canned foods. In transcending his reality to paint vibrant rural scenes, he was able to preserve the visual memory of bountiful Palestinian countryside for a generation of children born in the refugee camp. Further to this visionary approach to his own work, Ghannam was also one of the founding members of the General Union of Palestinian Artists and the General Federation of Arab Artists. Ghannam is the subject of Adnan Mdanat's 1977 documentary film ''Palestinian Visions''. He said in an interview: "I feel that my life stopped at the age of 17, because that is how old I was when I left, and I only live when I dream of those days."The Palestinians, by Jonathan Dimbleby
Ghannam found solace in playing the

oud , image=File:oud2.jpg , image_capt=Syrian oud made by Abdo Nahat in 1921 , background= , classification= * String instruments *Necked bowl lutes , hornbostel_sachs=321.321-6 , hornbostel_sachs_desc=Composite chordophone sounded with a plectrum , ...

(as pictured here).

Exhibitions

* 2020, ''The Naïve Arab Artist: Naïfs, Outsiders, L’art Autre, and L’art Brut in the Middle East,'' American University of Beirut Art Galleries, Beirut, Lebanon

References

Sources

Palestine Foundation for Culture
(in Arabic) 1930 births 1984 deaths Artists from Beirut Contemporary painters Palestinian painters Palestinian artists Lebanese artists Lebanese illustrators Palestinian illustrators {{Palestine-painter-stub

Biography

Exhibitions

See also

References

Sources