About Bahaa Souki
Bahaa Souki was born in Lebanon in 1984. In 2001, he joined the Faculty of Fine Arts and Architecture at the Lebanese University where he began his art studies.
In 2005, Souki started researching and experimenting with multiple disciplines including painting, photography, and videography. Since then, he has participated in many group exhibitions across Beirut, UAE, New York, and Rome. Bahaa moved to the UAE in 2013 and returned to Beirut in 2017 to settle and work, and has been primarily experimenting with pigment ink pens.
Artist Statement
"Spinning Yards" is an invitation to existing within conflict.
Faced with the vague and uncertain in a city of constant unrest, retrieving fragments of fading memory forces a perception beyond our coping mechanisms. What began as reflections on the October 17 Revolution in the streets of Lebanon shifted to tracing the destruction left by the Beirut Port Explosion. In black ink, the brutal deformation that our city, emotions, memories, and perceptions underwent is contrasted with the white frames that parallel each scene; a room to breathe, a moment to reflect, to absorb.
The exhibition is accompanied by a hand-written poem by Elige Abou Youness to reciprocate the works on display.
The poem
Spinning Yards
A beautiful meadow stretches before my eyes
The green was unending
Mountains
Unmoved
Unloved
Unshattered
My shadow is there
It’s barely walking
Lost in the smoke
It’s a blurr
The water is so clear with the grass growing out
The poppy splattering its redness on the green and brown
There was red next to my shadow
It was running all around
Crying
Carrying itself
Moving quickly
Like a poppy fighting the wind
To maintain its fragile leaves
But this is not nature
This is a blurr
Birds, frogs, a dog here and there
A boy with his friend
A mom walking
You could hear here
Nature taking its course
Leaves rustling
This was not nature
This can’t be nature
There was rustling
It’s a pending collapse
The screams are loud here
It’s heavy
It’s dark
It’s scary
I’m starting to feel my heartbeat
Take me out of this
I come back
A flock of birds is landing on the water
There’s snow on the mountain
It’s white
What’s left of it
It’s clean
No I can’t go back
I’m staying here
In nature
Where sounds are natural, birds, frogs, dogs, kids, and my injured friend walking in the back living his life beyond his trauma
Where the only red is the poppy petals
A lot of poppies
And daisies and
There’s smoke
Where the only panting is from the walk
I can’t go back
But it won’t leave my mind
Why did I see the smoke
- by Elige Abou Youness