Paintings like The Snake Charmer or The Black Bard are recognised by millions around the world, but few will instinctually attribute them to Orientalist painter Jean-Leon Gerome. Though not as famous as Vincent van Gogh or Claude Monet, Gerome was a unique painter who revolutionised Orientalist artwork, influencing thousands of artists.
Now, an exhibition in Doha titled Seeing is Believing: The Art and Influence of Gerome seeks to unpack this master painter and examine the last impact his work had on not just the art world, but western society’s perception of the Middle East for generations to come.
“Gerome was the most influential, marketed and successful artist in 19th century France,” curator Emily Weeks tells The National. "His reputation was international. His prestige, his fame, became also incredibly great throughout America and Britain, more broadly throughout Europe, even reaching Japan and Russia.
“His visions and creations shaped a world view. It shaped people's perceptions of the Mena region, so to present Gerome and his artworks in an Arab country, at an Arab institution, is of great significance.
“He taught over 2,000 international students during his lifetime, including very notable women artists, and they all bear the indelible handprint of Gerome. I would argue that every Orientalist work that was created after Gerome bears his handprint. He was that important, that influential.”
Organised by the Lusail Museum and Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, where the show is staged, more than 300 artworks will commemorate the 200th anniversary of the artist’s birth. The exhibition will run until February 22 and is curated by Weeks, Giles Hudson and Sara Raza.
The show is divided into three interconnected sections that invite viewers to reconsider Gerome's art and impact through both historical and contemporary lenses. The show brings together works from Mathaf’s Arab modern art and Qatar Museums’ general collections, alongside loans from institutions such as New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and Malaysia’s Islamic Arts Museum, as well as private collections.
Historically, he was a lauded figure, but in a post-Edward Said world where Orientalism is strongly criticised, his artwork has come under scrutiny for taking liberties with the truth and painting a skewed image of the region. However, Gerome was one of the few Orientalist artists who actually travelled to the Middle East and gathered source material from what he witnessed.
Orientalist paintings were in high demand, sometimes serving the purpose of "educational" windows into a region most people would never travel to, but were curious about all the same. Many painters created imaginary scenes, drawing from stereotypical images and archetypes to create their works.
Gerome was the best technically, and he also created dramatic, perfectly staged paintings that were a delicately made-up collage of images, but his puzzle pieces were also real. Those with a keen eye will notice the same helmet, rugs, figures or background scenes reproduced across different works in different ways.
Weeks, who curated the first section A Wider Lens, A New Gerome, explores this. The section presents new research on his life, artistic techniques and travels, showcasing works that illustrate his influence on generations of artists, including some never-seen-before works.
“He went seven or eight times to the region, particularly to Egypt and Istanbul," says Weeks. "His student, Stanislaus von Chlebowski, introduced him to the Ottoman Palace and Sultan, and Jerome not only sold his artworks, but he became the curator of their collection and their buyer. He is embedded in Ottoman culture and society. We also have these fantastic photographs from the Musee d'Orsay with Gerome on his donkey in Egypt, in the desert.
“Does he replicate the Orientalism of his predecessors? No, he does something entirely different. We have four examples here of artworks with themes that would become important to him, The Marketplace, Arms Dealer in Cairo from the Lusail collection, Prayer in the House of the Arnaut Chief, one of Gerome's earliest Orientalist works from 1859 and The Grave Threshers from 1869.
“What do critics say? Suddenly there is a realistic technique so painstakingly detailed it looks like a coloured photograph, not of harems, huntsmen and Bedouin horsemen, but we have scenes that seem like glimpses through a window into everyday life. Jerome marries these two; real life, or so it seems, and a real technique, and audiences love it.”
The second section, Truth is Stranger than Fiction, curated by Hudson, seeks to highlight the relationship between Gerome’s paintings and photography from the time, offering insights into how the medium influenced his artistic practice and perception of the East.
When creating his works he would have been plucking bits and pieces of imagery to compile in his paintings. Photography was invented in 1839 when Gerome was 14 and with the explosion of photography, many French photographers were active in the Middle East, with large archives available to the public.
“The first photo in this section comes from the studio of the Abdullah Brothers in Istanbul, who were a group of Armenian photographers, it shows the Topkapi Palace,” Hudson says. “If you look closely, you might recognise the tile pattern here as being the same tile panel that Gerome copied for The Black Bard painting.
“Photography in the 19th century was a black and white process as colour photography was not invented until after Gerome’s death, so he had no colour reference. The colours he actually paints in The Black Bard are different from the colours in reality at Topkapi Palace, which are in greens and yellows, but Gerome used blues in the tile.”
He also made great use of photography to publicise his work, intentionally choosing colours that reproduced well in photography. Certain hues were hard to pick up through the capabilities of the time, and some of the photos Gerome used as a reference also had missing parts that didn’t appear in development – including part of the Topkapi Palace tiles.
To make up for the missing section, Gerome instead took a pattern from the Blue Mosque in Cairo for The Black Bard painting. This is merely one example of the ripple effect photography had in relation to his work and beyond.
The final section, Truth is Stranger than Fiction, curated by Raza, takes a more modern approach. The section looks at the lasting impact of Gerome, but also how regional artists are reclaiming their image and disputing Orientalist impressions, with newly commissioned pieces from artists like Babi Badalov and Nadia Kaabi-Linke.
“There are 25 artists in my section, and each one of them is a single idea, but collectively, they come together to rethink Orientalism in the plural,” Raza says. “It becomes a conversation between East and West, rather than a one-way street. We start to think about the arbitrary nature, space, human geography and so on.”
The exhibition poses many questions but rather than give a definitive answer, it arms the viewer with information, multiple perspectives and the means to critically engage with Gerome’s legacy, which has constantly been reshaped by politics, global narrative and of course, the viewer’s gaze.
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
Most sought after workplace benefits in the UAE
- Flexible work arrangements
- Pension support
- Mental well-being assistance
- Insurance coverage for optical, dental, alternative medicine, cancer screening
- Financial well-being incentives
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Biography
Favourite Meal: Chicken Caesar salad
Hobbies: Travelling, going to the gym
Inspiration: Father, who was a captain in the UAE army
Favourite read: Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter
Favourite film: The Founder, about the establishment of McDonald's
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
The biog
Name: Fareed Lafta
Age: 40
From: Baghdad, Iraq
Mission: Promote world peace
Favourite poet: Al Mutanabbi
Role models: His parents
Bridgerton%20season%20three%20-%20part%20one
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirectors%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EVarious%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarring%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Nicola%20Coughlan%2C%20Luke%20Newton%2C%20Jonathan%20Bailey%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E3%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Company%20Profile
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ECompany%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Astra%20Tech%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EMarch%202022%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EDubai%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounder%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAbdallah%20Abu%20Sheikh%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EIndustry%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20technology%20investment%20and%20development%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunding%20size%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20%24500m%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Key recommendations
- Fewer criminals put behind bars and more to serve sentences in the community, with short sentences scrapped and many inmates released earlier.
- Greater use of curfews and exclusion zones to deliver tougher supervision than ever on criminals.
- Explore wider powers for judges to punish offenders by blocking them from attending football matches, banning them from driving or travelling abroad through an expansion of ‘ancillary orders’.
- More Intensive Supervision Courts to tackle the root causes of crime such as alcohol and drug abuse – forcing repeat offenders to take part in tough treatment programmes or face prison.
MOUNTAINHEAD REVIEW
Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman
Director: Jesse Armstrong
Rating: 3.5/5
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
More on Quran memorisation:
Mia Man’s tips for fermentation
- Start with a simple recipe such as yogurt or sauerkraut
- Keep your hands and kitchen tools clean. Sanitize knives, cutting boards, tongs and storage jars with boiling water before you start.
- Mold is bad: the colour pink is a sign of mold. If yogurt turns pink as it ferments, you need to discard it and start again. For kraut, if you remove the top leaves and see any sign of mold, you should discard the batch.
- Always use clean, closed, airtight lids and containers such as mason jars when fermenting yogurt and kraut. Keep the lid closed to prevent insects and contaminants from getting in.
The years Ramadan fell in May
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Stamp duty timeline
December 2014: Former UK finance minister George Osbourne reforms stamp duty, replacing the slab system with a blended rate scheme, with the top rate increasing to 12 per cent from 10 per cent:
Up to £125,000 - 0%; £125,000 to £250,000 – 2%; £250,000 to £925,000 – 5%; £925,000 to £1.5m: 10%; Over £1.5m – 12%
April 2016: New 3% surcharge applied to any buy-to-let properties or additional homes purchased.
July 2020: Rishi Sunak unveils SDLT holiday, with no tax to pay on the first £500,000, with buyers saving up to £15,000.
March 2021: Mr Sunak decides the fate of SDLT holiday at his March 3 budget, with expectations he will extend the perk unti June.
April 2021: 2% SDLT surcharge added to property transactions made by overseas buyers.
Dubai Bling season three
Cast: Loujain Adada, Zeina Khoury, Farhana Bodi, Ebraheem Al Samadi, Mona Kattan, and couples Safa & Fahad Siddiqui and DJ Bliss & Danya Mohammed
Rating: 1/5
THE DETAILS
Kaala
Dir: Pa. Ranjith
Starring: Rajinikanth, Huma Qureshi, Easwari Rao, Nana Patekar
Rating: 1.5/5
Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
The Perfect Couple
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Liev Schreiber, Jack Reynor
Creator: Jenna Lamia
Rating: 3/5
More on Quran memorisation:
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
Defence review at a glance
• Increase defence spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2027 but given “turbulent times it may be necessary to go faster”
• Prioritise a shift towards working with AI and autonomous systems
• Invest in the resilience of military space systems.
• Number of active reserves should be increased by 20%
• More F-35 fighter jets required in the next decade
• New “hybrid Navy” with AUKUS submarines and autonomous vessels
Avatar%3A%20The%20Way%20of%20Water
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EJames%20Cameron%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStars%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ESam%20Worthington%2C%20Zoe%20Saldana%2C%20Sigourney%20Weaver%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E3.5%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Read more from Johann Chacko
The five pillars of Islam
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Zayed Sustainability Prize
Vidaamuyarchi
Director: Magizh Thirumeni
Stars: Ajith Kumar, Arjun Sarja, Trisha Krishnan, Regina Cassandra
Rating: 4/5
The five pillars of Islam
1. Fasting
2. Prayer
3. Hajj
4. Shahada
5. Zakat
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
TV: World Cup Qualifier 2018 matches will be aired on on OSN Sports HD Cricket channel
Read more about the coronavirus
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
Analysis
Members of Syria's Alawite minority community face threat in their heartland after one of the deadliest days in country’s recent history. Read more
The years Ramadan fell in May
More from Neighbourhood Watch
More from Neighbourhood Watch
Biog
Mr Kandhari is legally authorised to conduct marriages in the gurdwara
He has officiated weddings of Sikhs and people of different faiths from Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Russia, the US and Canada
Father of two sons, grandfather of six
Plays golf once a week
Enjoys trying new holiday destinations with his wife and family
Walks for an hour every morning
Completed a Bachelor of Commerce degree in Loyola College, Chennai, India
2019 is a milestone because he completes 50 years in business
How to watch Ireland v Pakistan in UAE
When: The one-off Test starts on Friday, May 11
What time: Each day’s play is scheduled to start at 2pm UAE time.
TV: The match will be broadcast on OSN Sports Cricket HD. Subscribers to the channel can also stream the action live on OSN Play.
The%20Sandman
%3Cp%3ECreators%3A%20Neil%20Gaiman%2C%20David%20Goyer%2C%20Allan%20Heinberg%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3EStars%3A%20Tom%20Sturridge%2C%20Boyd%20Holbrook%2C%20Jenna%20Coleman%20and%20Gwendoline%20Christie%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3ERating%3A%204%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – FINAL RECKONING
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
Starring: Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Simon Pegg
Rating: 4/5
Six large-scale objects on show
- Concrete wall and windows from the now demolished Robin Hood Gardens housing estate in Poplar
- The 17th Century Agra Colonnade, from the bathhouse of the fort of Agra in India
- A stagecloth for The Ballet Russes that is 10m high – the largest Picasso in the world
- Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1930s Kaufmann Office
- A full-scale Frankfurt Kitchen designed by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, which transformed kitchen design in the 20th century
- Torrijos Palace dome
More from Rashmee Roshan Lall
More about Middle East geopolitics
