Out of Africa Gallery | HIGHLANDS OF SUDAN

Out of Africa Gallery is pleased to present HIGHLANDS OF SUDAN.

Fascinated by the landscape of Khartoum, which sits at the confluence of the White Nile — flowing north from Lake Victoria — and the Blue Nile, flowing west from Lake Tana in Ethiopia, Miska Mohmmed turned her fascination into the subject of her art.

As the talented young artist noted on Instagram on January 8th of this year, “Practice makes progress,” but it was her daring experimentation that caused her to get where she is with her art today. Her biggest breakthrough came in a mixed-media scene she labeled #daily_sketches, #landscape_painting on May 28, 2019.

A colorful abstraction composed through a series of horizontal brushstrokes and freely drawn lines, this landscape is notable for the circular forms that move our eyes across the picture plane. Inspired by swirls on the Nile, these forms soon became a signature part of her improvisational landscapes, which became even more experimental as Mohmmed added quickly rendered lines and dots to her lively way of creating an environmental scene — whether real or imagined. Dubbing these panoramic views as “Mindscapes,” she made a series of short films to share her personal style of working with her online audience.

“I had the feeling that if I painted the scene as it is there was nothing new,” she shared in a recent Whatsapp visit to her studio in Nairobi, where she has lived and worked for the past few years. “I wanted to put myself in the landscape, more than just painting reality.” As a result, Mohmmed’s landscapes convey the impression of a world in constant motion. It’s like the artist — and the viewer — is at the center of the action as everything around her — or us — is moving. The scene is fluid, and the way this spirited artist composes it is equally as fluent.

Whether working in a sketchbook or painting a large canvas, it’s a process of action and reaction — a brushstroke leads to a line, and a line leads to more brushwork. Having spent her life lovingly observing a variety of landscapes in Sudan, Saudi Arabia and Kenya, as well as through past travels to North Africa, Mohmmed has them fixed in her memory — yet each one is different, depending on the terrain, the season, the weather and the time of day.

Reducing mountains and trees, buildings and lights, rivers and seas to color and form, she creates harmonious pictures that represent a sense of a scene, a feeling of a place. The landscape keeps changing and the artist is trying to capture all of these changes. Aptly described as “a symphony of colors that dance across the canvas,” her landscapes are painted with intuitive emotion. Making memory maps, and inventing as she goes along, Mohmmed creates a pliable world — one that pulsates with exciting possibilities
Paul Laster

The show runs from 28 October - 3 December 2023.