São Paulo – In February, Syrian painter Layla Ousta is doing an art residency at Kaaysá Art Residency, a space where artists from various countries take turns in exchanging experiences and expanding their techniques and knowledges. The venue is at the Boiçucanga Beach in São Sebastião, São Paulo state, where entrepreneur Lourdina Jean Rabieh welcomes visitors who start new projects inspired by the contact with nature and the residency itself.
Ousta is from Damascus, Syria, where she divides her time between volunteering at a hospital and working at her studio. That’s where she teaches calligraphy, makes works based on Arabic writings, and creates paintings and sculptures. “The most important experience in my life,” she said on Wednesday (21) about her stay in Brazil. She visited the Arab-Brazilian Chamber of Commerce (ABCC) in São Paulo, accompanied by Rabieh. They were welcomed in the institution by director Claudia Yazigi Haddad. (Pictured above, L to R, Rabieh, Ousta, and Haddad).
What amazed her the most in Brazil, she told ANBA, was the nature, particularly the butterflies and birds. Blue butterflies and toucans are part of her portfolio now. A painting she made during her Brazilian experience portrays a toucan with a commedia dell’arte hat. “The hat I painted influenced by the Carnaval. The playing cards represent what life is,” she says, “a game.” Other works she painted portray butterflies and bromelias.
Playing card symbols are common in Ousta’s painting, as well as black and white. “Every artist has their own world. I come from a bad situation. My experience here brings me light, hope,” she says.
The opportunity to visit Brazil arose in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, last year. There she met ambassador’s wife Claudia Barenco Abbas, who invited her for a residency in Brazil. Through her, Ousta had an opportunity to travel to the Latin American country for a season at Kaaysá with the support of retail chain Magazine Luiza (Magalu). Rabieh had previously welcomed other Arab artists. In January, Juahida Bittar, also from Syria, bid farewell to Kaaysá. Rabieh says that other Arabs are expected to come to the coastal residency in the coming months.
Translated by Guilherme Miranda
