Tahia Halim

Biography

Tahia Halim received her first drawing lessons from the Lebanese painter Yussef Trabelsi and a Greek artist named Gerom (the second teacher’s full name is hard to establish).

She was born on 9 September 1919 in Sudan, where her family was living at the time. She grew up in Cairo, in the royal palace: her father was attached to the court of King Fuad I, but what exactly he did, I have no documents to say. She received her primary education there too. In 1943 she began working in the studio of the Egyptian artist Hamed Abdallah. In 1945 they married. From 1949 to 1951 she studied at the Académie Julian in Paris. After returning to Egypt, the couple taught together in a private studio in downtown Cairo, near Tahrir Square. She had been showing at the Cairo Salon since 1943. From 1942 to 1996 she had many solo exhibitions, among them shows in England and Sweden. In 1954 her works were shown at the São Paulo Biennial, in 1955, 1960 and 1970 at the Venice Biennale, and in 1955, 1958 and 1960 at the Alexandria Biennial for Mediterranean Countries. In 1957 she took part in the Guggenheim International Competition in New York, and in 1958 she won its prize.

In 1960 she was awarded a gold medal for painting, on Knowledge Day. In the same year, and again in 1975, she received a state grant for art production. In 1969 she was given the State Encouragement Prize in Painting and the Order of Science and Art, and she received the same encouragement prize again in 1996.

In the 1960s she is named as one of the first representatives in Egyptian art of the so-called Modern Expressive Movement. She painted Nubian culture, the Nile, boats, and popular and national subjects, trying to convey the particular traits of the Egyptian character. To my mind, the essence of this manner is easiest to see in her simplified forms and her turning away from Western models, but I cannot check that against the canvases themselves from the sources available.

Later her works were shown in the exhibitions “The Sea Suspended” (Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, 2016) and “The Short Century” (Sharjah Art Museum, 2016). They are held in the Museum of Modern Egyptian Art in Cairo, the Alexandria Modern Art Museum, the Modern Art Museum in Stockholm and the Barjeel Art Foundation collection.

Tahia Halim died in Cairo on 24 May 2003. In 2004 an exhibition of her work was held at the Ewart Gallery of the American University in Cairo.