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In Man and Mask, ironically it is the mask that looks human, with asymmetric but existing features, while the mans face is a contorted half with the other half a straight facet cut in golden bronze. The statue is bigger this time, the hands holding the mask clenched in fists and the shaped part of the head almost hideous. Is the mask meant to hide his face? Is it meant to hide his identity and thoughts?

The Man with Women is a seated figure, hands on the knees, shoulders holding the torsos and heads of three stylized women whose salient point are the breasts. Erotic or motherly, one is left to ask, but perhaps unable to answer.

That is, not before the next group, that of Man and His Dreams, where a half whole, half hollowed man, seated again, has his dreams on the panel next to him etched in squares.

Apparently, all he dreams of are women's faces, torsos and hearts. But while the man's shape is vague, the dreams are clearly defined; the artist again plays with real and virtual reality, with upside down values and perceptions. Headless Man is just that: a figure whose lower limbs form a the forelegs of a frame he sits on and whose hands have become an integral part of his square-shaped body.

The Man in a Square has assumed bloating proportions, his body expanded and trying to pass through two crossing diagonal lines that seem to block his way. Doubly prisoner, he seems to also have doubled in size to escape his fate. Dream-like and unreal, stylized to the point of being grotesquely deformed, the statues are epitomized in the form of Sisyphus whose plight is symbolized in a huge rock covering his head and part of his body, pushing him to an inclined position, struggling to overcome the mythological curse.

Departing from the bronze sculptures, the artists paintings are mostly of faces and heads with features clearly defined in bright colours and usually in groups of two or many more.

Of mixed media, acrylic and ink on paper and canvas, the painted pairs are usually of a man and a woman (or more in some cases) and the many are simply titled: Nine Faces, Twelve Painted Faces or Seven Faces. Very often the mask is present as if with the desire to hide true feelings of facial expressions behind it.

Two big-size canvases of pairs have a pigeon and a colourful cock respectively, but normally the paintings are of stark faces peering at the viewer from the frames, often framed themselves, again , by a mask. the works often look like naive painting, but at times, voluptuously curved figures confirm the artistic potential of the author.

Ica Wahbeh
Jordan Times, 29th Nov. 1995

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