Mohamed Essawy (b. 1989) is an artist born in Cairo, Egypt, based in Dubai. His eclectic and modern style combines disparate and even interdisciplinary elements with experimental mixed media. His creativity has no limits, which is why it is very difficult to label his work. His pieces are inspired by music, pop art, abstraction, and urban art. The goal of his art is to reach people through the feelings or reflections that his works arouse.
From a very young age, Mohamed has been representing his vision of the world through draw-ing, inspired by his dreams and the beauty that surrounded him. But the artist temporarily hung up the paintbrush after being consumed by a world of social and cultural acceptance, until 2019 when he embraced his first passion.
His most recent collection is composed of paintings made with acrylic on handmade Egyptian papyrus that bring abstraction and pop art together once again. The artist creates pieces brimming with energy that integrate the viewer into the scene through the use of bright, satu-rated colors. They are also imbued with a certain naivety through the cartoonish style of his drawing, accompanied by undulating brushstrokes that set the rhythm.
It could be said that this collection is built by the balance of different binomials, which demon-strate Mohamed's versatility. This is how we can appreciate in the same piece the interaction between a free and introspective technique such as abstract expressionism on a superficial art with more attention to the line, as pop art is. It is also evident the tension between tradition and modernity, where an ancient traditional technique coexists with modern ones. It is not only about techniques, it is a space where two different worlds collide, two cultures separated by years of history.
And it is there, in that contradiction where Mohamed finds the creation, it is in that tension where Mohamed imposes himself in front of the global scenario of contemporary art from a re-reading of his cultural heritage and identity.