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A Daughter of Fragrant and Colour

By Nujum Al Ganim &
Hassan Sharif

Najat Makki was born in 1956 in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. She is a daughter of a
druggist who had a shop of aromatic oils and traditional herbs. May be because of that Makki’s
art work has always a mixture of a strong pleasant fragrant and a deep, natural touch of colour.
She even once painted some of her paintings with Saffron, Henna and some other herbal
substances.

Unlike many of her schoolmates, Makki showed an earlier artistic talent in drawing. When she
had still been in high school, she participated in one of the earliest art exhibitions in the U.A.E.
since then she made up her mind to study Art which was unlikely decision in her family.
However, Makki was one of few artists and maybe the first woman to earn a government
scholarship to study Art abroad in 1977. She received her Bachelor degree in Relief and Medal
from the college of Fine Arts in Cairo in 1982. In 1997, she also became the first artist from the
U.A.E to earn a Master of Fine Arts in Sculpture from the same college.

Understanding her responsibility in her modern development country, Makki believes that she
must participate in the educational field and encourage some more artists to take place in society.
Therefore, she not only locks herself up in her studio to just produce artwork, but also spends a
great deal of her time teaching and organizing art exhibitions for children and youth. Nowadays,
Makki teaches art in the Dubai Women’s Association and becomes an instructor for some art
workshops at the National Youth Theater and Arts.

“Art is very important for children. It builds their minds and makes them aware of their skills”.
She says: She also thinks that children can use their wild imagination and translate what they feel
and see to colours and lines. “Their creation becomes then a product of beauty and joy in the
eyes of others”. She asserts.

As a woman, Najat Makki knows her role very well in society. She sometimes adopts some
feminist issues in her paintings as well as in her sculpture. Yet, she is not totally devoted to
feminism. She says: “Art for me is more than how a woman dresses, decorates her home, cleans
and cooks. I’am not part of this image and I’ll never be”.

She makes her sculptures and paintings for the audience to communicate with because she
believes that understanding the artwork resembles owning it.

In her paintings, Najat Makki emphasizes the colours and lines in order to create special
harmony or special language. Her lines seem to be flying or dancing, her figures stand out
strongly and impressively. Such as in the Pharaohs relief, which has a great influence on her,
Makki’s paintings are easily distinguished by their small motives and figures. However, her
figures seem to be flown in wavy motions as if they were part of a big unfinished mosaic. Her
colours are picked up as pure as possible and applied to the canvas with great concentration on
nuances and contrasts of tone.

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Najat Makki wants the colours and forms to remain orchestrated as well as modulated. She
stabilizes a successive serious of movements which are arranged in an architectural form. This
obtains an overall harmonic effect. Some of her paintings are composed within a circle set
against a black background.

She says;” The circle symbolizes life, which is endless and eternal. Symbol of perfection plus
these circular paintings are pleasing to the eye. They refer to the purity of the soul with which we
human beings are gifted”

Like most of those true artists, Makki likes to work in an isolated environment where she can
express herself freely and deeply. She says: “I work on my paintings when I am in a pensive
mood and by myself in a serene atmosphere. Most of my inspiration comes from my own
childhood and Pharaohs sculpture and relief which I have been studying since I went to
college.”

For several years, Makki has been exploiting a large and unusual range of techniques and
materials. In her sculpture she uses plastic, stone, iron, glass, fiberglass, and other found
materials. In her paintings she uses either oil colours or Acrylic colours accompanied, in some
cases, with a combination of different kinds of fabric. Furthermore, Makki has been
experimenting some other environmental and traditional substances, which contribute towards
making her paintings appear to be unique. These elements not only helped Makki’s artwork to be
distinguished from her peers, but also create certain identity for her.

One of her unforgettable shows was held in 1987. For that show, Makki used phosphorescent
colours in both her paintings and sculpture. She displayed those art works in a dark room lit by
special neon lights where the spectators had to walk in and look at the works in a special mood
and amount of light.

Even thought her art is a very well received and known in her country, she thinks that the
International spectators communicate and understand her work better.

Although Makki is considered one of the most famous artists in the U.A.E she has been working
as an art supervisor in the Ministry of Education since she received her BA.

Presently, Najat Makki is working on her dissertation with a hope to obtain her Ph.D. soon.

Al Khaleej
Nov. 2, 1999

Translated by Dr. Hassan El Rayah