Google celebrated the 121^st birthday of Mamoud Mukhtar مـحـــمـــــود مــخــتــــــار last Thursday.  Mukhtar was one of the few leading Egyptian sculptors نــَــحــَّــاتــيـــن . He is the maker of the famous Nahdit Misr Statue تــِــمــثــــال نــهــضــــة مِـصـــر (Egypt’s Renaissance Sculpture) and has a museum named after him in Cairo that exhibits his numerous works. His museum مــُــتــحــَــف is a very important destination to all students of arts and sculptures. The museum is also a witness شــَــاهــِــــدto a very important political and historical period ofEgypt’s history. Mukhtar is regarded as the father of the Modern Egyptian Sculpture. His works are distinguished for their realism as they reflect the everyday life or ordinary people in the countryside where he grew up.

      Mukhtar was born on May 10^th 1891 in a small village in Mahalla, Egypt. His father was the Mayor of the village. Mukhtar lived with his grandmother and used to spend most of his time by the canal playing with mud and clay, shaping and making sculptures تــمــاثــيـــــل of the environment around him. Mukhtar moved to live in Cairo in 1902. When he was seventeen, he joined the newly-opened School of Fine Arts مــَــدرســَـــة الــفــُـــنــُـــون الــجــمــيــــلــة . The foreign teachers discovered and admired his talent مــَــوْهــِـــبــَـــــة , so they set a special place for him to practise his art of sculpturing. The patron راعــِــــىof the school;

Prince Youssef Kamal sent Mukhtar on a scholarship toParis to finish his studies.

      Mukhtar lived a life full of success and struggle to put the sculpture craft in a high position in a society that looks at sculptures as an extension اِمــْـــتــِـــــدَاد of paganism الــوَثـــَـــنـــِـــيـــَّـــــة and idolatry عــِـــبـــَــــادَة الأصـــنـــْــــــام . Mukhtar dedicated his talent to serve the patriotic movement in his country at the time. His works reflected the political and social stage when he lived; the renaissance stage, especially at the time of the 1919 Revolution. His art got all the praise ثــنـــَـــاء and

respect إِحـــتـــِـــرَام of the French artists and critics. He also got an enthusiastic support تـــأيــيـــــد from the Egyptian people.

     Mukhtar was the first Egyptian to exhibit an artistic work in an international exhibition مــَــعــْـــرَض دَولــِـــى in Paris. He was the first Egyptian artist to win an award جــَـــائـــِــــزَة from a Parisian Salon when he got the gold medal from the French Artists Annual Exihibiton that is set in the Grand Palais for a small model of the sculpture of Nahdit Misr. A bigger copy was made and set in the biggest square of Cairo. He got another award from the Parisian Salon Exihibition in 1925 for a sculpture of Om Kolthoum أم كلثوم. He was also the first Arab artist to have a sculpture exihibition of his own in Paris in 1930. He was also the

 first Arab artist to be welcomed by demonstrations in Alexandria after his return from Europe. His sculpture of the Egyptian leader زعــِــيـــــم ; Saad Zaghloul is still a landmark عــَــلامــَـــة بــَـــارِزة of Alexandria.

      Mukhtar died on March 27, 1934 and in spite of his short life, he left a great and distinguished collection of sculptures. He managed to express his culture ثـــَــــقــــَــــافــــَـــــة and background خـــَـــلْــــفـــِـــيـــّــــة by his special style. He revived the Egyptian artistic traditions تــَــقـــَـــالــِـــيـــد  in all ages and did not forget the modern art experiences. He was and still an honrable figure in the history of the modern Egyptian art. That is why the government built a museum for him and his works and did great efforts to restore his works from France.

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Peace  ســَـــلام /Salam/