Cairo, monotype

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Cairo, monotype, 10.3 x 11.8 cm, 2011

This was made some years ago in Cairo and then forgotten about.

It was painted from the nice Bristol Hotel- completely empty except for myself and an obese American woman, heavily painted and in late middle-age (rather conceited, who was married to an Algerian in whose country she lived. She had worked as a dancer and I believe that this talent as well as her girth made her favourable to male Arab taste. She was enthusiastic about the military in Algeria, and seemed to lead a life of ease. But though she boasted of her lifestyle she wore a sour face and seemed miserable) and the ironical and elegant men who seemed to have no object other than to be amiable and who staff the place. This was during Egypt's hapless"revolution" and there were few tourists in the city.

The hotel was  calm amid the general hubbub and ghastliness of the city.

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A trip to Egypt: Cairo

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 Nine from Cairo, in their carriers

 Cairo: a street, oil on card, 10 x 12 cm  SOLD

 Cairo is a fine messy polluted annoying place  for painting. There is a good range of different styles of buildings and the sense of being somewhere that matters.

I painted in various places: I worked from hotels, I visited the pyramids in Giza across the river, and I looked at churches and mosques from the Citadel area and from the Coptic neighbourhood.

 Cairo- from Ismaili House Hotel, oil on card, 15 x 12 cm  SOLD

This hotel had splendid views. I stayed there on the first night, it is behind Tahir square. But it is fillthy, so I moved to another, the splendid Victoria Hotel, where the manager kindly permitted me to work from the roof.

 Cairo, apartments,  painted from the Victoria Hotel, oil on card, 12.5 x 14 cm  SOLD

 From the Victoria Hotel, Cairo, oil on card, 11 x 14 cm  SOLD

Above is my hotel window, and below is the view at night.

 Nocturne, Cairo, 8 x 10 cm, oil on card  SOLD

Cairo- a view from the roof of the Victoria Hotel, oil on card, 12 x 8 cm  SOLD

I visited the pyramids: the light shifting across them is a wonderful thing to watch. I want to return.

Pyramids, and the city.oil on card, 12.5 x 14 cm

A pyramid, Giza, oil on card, 14 x 11 cm  SOLD

I saw the Coptic Cathedral and churches:

Cairo, Coptic Cathedral, oil on card, 10 x 14 cm  SOLD

And I painted mosques in and around the Citadel:

 Cairo, inside a Mosque, oil on card, 14 x 14 cm  SOLD

 Cairo, Mosque, oil on card, 11.5 x 13.5 cm  SOLD

Mosque painted from the Citadel, Cairo, oil on card, 12.5 x 9 cm  SOLD

Finally, here is Cairo from the parking area below the citadel:

Cairo- a view from the Citadel, looking south, oil on card, 16 x 11 cm  SOLD

And here, to end, is the Nile:

Cairo, the Nile, oil on card, 11 x 15 cm  SOLD

I spent a week in Cairo, but one could spend a lifetime. it isn't an easy city- it`s polluted and messy and very noisy.

 But it is extremely interesting, and it is cheap to visit now, given that Egypt`s years of political crisis have devastated the tourist industry.  So I regret that I didn`t have time to do more than scrape the surface.

Two pyramids, Giza, oil on card, 14 x 11 cm  AVAILABLE

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