Khalid Abdel Rahman

Khalid Abdel Rahman has a very characteristic style of abstract architectural scenes from the Khartoum neighborhoods. It documents a slowly disappearing middle class, either because it works with the government or because it leaves the country in search of better living conditions. The bright and sad colours of these empty neighbourhoods reflect the reality of a class and an endangered people. Like a surreal scene taken from a memory seen in a dream.

“I always think of my artistic work as an extension of the local Sufi poetic tradition that values the eye of contentment or the good eye that sees beauty in everything. With this concept in mind, I walk every day to look at my environment and take pictures and sketches, then I return to the workshop to produce the final result, usually a simple drawing with soft pastels on paper.
My goal in this work is to celebrate the local and the ordinary and, I hope, to inspire those who look at my art to look carefully at the things around them."