Syrian Landscapes: A Visual Journey

Dummar Road is a medium-sized oil painting by Syrian artist Tawfik Tarek. The significance of this work lies in the documentation of the railroad that existed at the time of its painting in 1908, which connected the city of Damascus to the port of Beirut.

The scene depicts the train passing through Dummar, an area that, due to urbanization, is now considered part of Damascus City.

In the painting, The railway cuts through the landscape, where we recognize poplar trees in two basic shades of dark and pale green, the defining characteristics of their leaves.

‘Mountains of Lebanon’ by Syrian artist Michael Kurcheh is a panoramic oil painting that depicts the vastness of the horizon as can be seen from Lebanon's natural mountain range.

The artist was keen to capture the wild trees and the fertile land with its red soil, grouping them to the right of the canvas while leaving plenty of space for the viewer to contemplate the sky and perhaps the sea below the horizon.

Like many of Said Tahsin's works, this scene shows the artist's connection to the Damascene environment and his desire to document its details.

A shy side of the painting shows a group of people sitting on the banks of the Barada River in the Rabwah area.

Tahsin also depicts Levantine poplar trees in a nod to Tawfik Tarek's work.

In this untitled work painted in thick oil colors on a wooden board by Turkish-Syrian artist Toros, we explore a vibrant landscape punctuated by a stone bridge that is likely one of the bridges connecting the two banks of the Qweiq River in the artist's hometown of Aleppo.

The freshness of the vegetation suggests a springtime atmosphere.

Despite the tranquil nature of the view, the brush and palette knife strokes reveal the presence of a gentle breeze on the water's surface and the cloudy sky.

Mahmoud Jalal, a Libyan-born artist who has lived in Syria, presents a scene from the surroundings of a Syrian village.

We recognize it from the natural terrain and cacti surrounding the architecture that is widespread in the country, especially the Mezzeh area in Damascus and the cities of southern Syria.

The shadows of the cacti on the soil enhance the impression of light intensity, an aesthetic value that emphasizes the natural identity of the region.

In his signature style of abstracting pictorial details into color spaces and gradients, Louay Kayyali presents a pleasant landscape in his work Raa's al-Basit or Al Basit Cape, a geographical cape on the Syrian coast.

 In it, he depicts a calm sea mixed with some greenery that adds warmth to the scene. Small cottages appear partially hidden behind what seems to be the edge of a small plateau, achieving color and composition variety.

The two works entitled "Landscape" by Nassir Shoura reveal the artist's desire to go beyond the realistic expressionism he used in previous works.

We see the trees have become simplified to near abstraction while retaining the primary role of color in expression despite the artist's departure from the natural color of the plants. 

In his untitled work, Omar Hamdi presents a different conceptualization of the traditional landscape in painting, both in composition and form.

In this oil painting, he cuts out a section that resembles a photographic snapshot, placing the viewer in the shoes of an internal observer, unseparated from the tree whose autumnal leaves are in the foreground of the painting.

Farouk Kondakji's work shows a strong connection to the land. 

On the surface of the large-scale painting, the artist depicts a vast expanse of yellowish-green grass, topped by a gray sky that hints at a humid climate. This expressive reductionism makes the painting seem abstract at first glance.