Frame by frame-The scenic compositions of Ammar Al-Beik
"Where is the newness?" asks Ammar Al-Beik. "Fairuz, Old Damascene houses, Nizar Qabbani... they are all clichés!" As a cinematographer, Al-Beik should be at the forefront of innovation but he works in a field that still finds it hard to refrain from glorifying past artistic glories, sadly to the expense of the present. "Did you know there's a new musical trend called Trip-Hop? Not Hip-Hop, but Trip-Hop?" he asks with an enthusiasm he can barely conceal. And so he asks again where the newness is.
Don't misread Al-Beik's intentions; he has no wish to divorce himself from who he is or where he has come from. "It's not necessary for an artist to be someone who leaves behind his family and the people who need him for the sake of art." After all, turning a blind-eye to reality would only lead him towards "a selfishness that I will not indulge," he says. Al-Beik lives a precarious balancing act; he is pursuing the cutting edge of artistic expression while also giving his care to the traditional environment of his home.
Ammar's mastery of light, captured beautifully in ‘Light Harvest', possesses an innate and continuous sense of rhythm and passing time. "It's about the mill next to my home, I hear the sounds from my room; the workers coming-and-going in the early morning, carrying their sacks of wheat. This is my world," he says. Having received no official training, he was quite surprised that his three-minute film received the 2000 Liege Mayor's Award in Belgium. "I felt like filming but I had no idea what I was doing, and that it has a name called ‘cinematography'," he says. "I was just having fun."
‘I Am the One Who Brings Flowers to her Grave' premiered at the 63rd Venice International Film Festival in 2006. "I could not believe it! Sitting in a cinema with the likes of Brad Pitt, and everyone else there to watch my film! It was the first Syrian film ever to enter the competition?" remarks Al-Beik who continues to be blown away by the memory of the event. Unpretentious yet totally driven, Al-Beik is modest yet confidently unstoppable. The fact that he has achieved international recognition despite having neither educational foundation nor connections within the industry is testament to his talent.
Al-Beik's spirited enthusiasm is coupled with a serious devotion to hard-work. "No matter what they say, making a good film is not about group effort," he says. "It is about the single-minded clarity of the director's vision... and his skilfulness in staying true no matter what obstacles arise."
‘Video Games' is the title of his latest series of three-minute portraits of fellow artists in Syria. Within the context of an exhibition, Al-Beik also presents images of digitally manipulated sketches by artists from the previous generation; creating a visual dialogue between two separate worlds; and juxtaposing Louay Kayyali with Fateh Moudarres for example.
Moving to Al-Beik's photographic practice, his works are carefully designed compositions, often possessing a narrative dimension as well as abstractions of colour and pattern. In his static examination of relationships, large images frame small images, fringe images allude to central ones, while colours contrast with black-and-white and repetition with singularity. Works such as ‘The Museum Warden', ‘Sokourov's Mother and Son', ‘The Lost City' and ‘Abu Ghraib' are executed in his medium of choice - ultra chrome ink print on canvas - which, despite the chemical stench, is the only one that gives the colour intensity he desires. Ishtar (or Aphrodite) sculptures appear frequently in his work. "They are nudes... antique stone sculptures from the National Museum in Damascus; probably the only legitimate example of the naked body in Syria," he says. "There's a reality to nudity that has nothing to do with shame or disgrace. It's about being real." Defining what makes a person real is open to interpretation. In Al-Beik's artistic practice - from film to photography - he unveils to the viewer a person and a location in every story through a thoughtfully manipulated collection of memories.
For more information on the artist contact:
Ayyam Gallery
Zain Mahjoub
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