Dia AL-AZZAWI British / Iraqi, b. 1939
Dialogue, 1994–95
Acrylic on canvas
56 x 46 cm
This painting is about the lovers Majnun and Layla. Dia made a lot of work about these legendary lovers in the mid-1990s as part of a project with the Bahraini...
This painting is about the lovers Majnun and Layla. Dia made a lot of work about these legendary lovers in the mid-1990s as part of a project with the Bahraini poet Qassim Haddad. This painting is quite unusual for the project because it only shows Majnun (whose name literally means “possessed by jinn” ie “mad”). Tragically, Dia explained that he was driven so sad by his love for Layla that he is having a conversation with himself, hence the ironic title ‘Dialogue’.