Jogging (1985) by RAFIK EL KAMELDalloul Art Foundation
Who is Rafik El Kamel?
A Tunisian painter born in 1944 in Tunis, Rafik El Kamel graduated from the Institute supérieur des Beaux-Arts in Tunis in 1966 and École des Arts Décoratifs in Paris in 1970. He returned to Tunisia in 1971 and taught at his alma mater while building his artistic career.
Representing the real had the effect of confronting El Kamel more directly with the challenges and theoretical debates of his time: what to paint and how to paint as a Tunisian artist without falling into exotic Orientalism, nor in the vain search for a universality that rejects his own identity
El Kamel answers to this dilemma by choosing to paint the contemporary portrait of "his" Tunisia, with its streets loaded with both history and present, and its everyday life scene.
Where leather jackets, floral skirts, and traditional headgear can co-exist, where baby foot players, party-goers and shoe shiners meet.
By subtly surpassing this eternal debate without falling into caricature, nostalgia or over-intellectualization, El Kamel transmits a specific and striking trace in the history of modern Tunisian art.
From the full biography of https://dafbeirut.org/en/rafik-el-kamel by Layla Abdelké Yakoub, translated by Fadia Antar
