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Eclectic Wonders: The Collection of Timothy Egert

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9^* — Jewad Selim (Iraq, 1919-1961) Still life with Statuette

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10^* — Mamdouh Kashlan (Syria, 1929-2022) Before The Light Fades (Kabl An Yazoul Al Djaw)

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11 — Mahmoud Sabri (Iraq, 1927-2012) Study of a Rural Family

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12 — Mahmoud Sabri (Iraq, 1927-2012) Mother and Child

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13 — Mahmoud Sabri (Iraq, 1927-2012) Public Bath

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14 — Mahmoud Sabri (Iraq, 1927-2012) H20 + AG + AiR (From the Quantum Realism Series)

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£30,000 - £50,000

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19^AR — Dia Al-Azzawi (Iraq, born 1939) Al Shamr

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20^AR — Dia Al-Azzawi (Iraq, born 1939) Arabic Image II

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21^AR — Dia Al-Azzawi (Iraq, born 1939) Drawings Consecrated to Love

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22^AR — Dia Al-Azzawi (Iraq, born 1939) Horse

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23^AR — Dia Al-Azzawi (Iraq, born 1939) Composition

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24^AR — Shafic Abboud (Lebanon, 1926-2004) Le Cafe a Gien

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Lot 39^AR

Lorna Selim
(Iraq, 1928-2021)
The Lemon Sellers

Modern and Contemporary Middle Eastern Art including Baghdadiyat: Iraqi Masterpieces from the Madhloom and Makiya Collections

2 June 2021, 16:00 BST

London, New Bond Street

Sold for £10,200 inc. premium

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Lorna Selim (Iraq, 1928-2021)

The Lemon Sellers
oil on board, framed
signed "Lorna Selim" and dated "1956" in Arabic (lower right), executed in 1956
45 x 60cm (17 11/16 x 23 5/8in).

Footnotes

Provenance:
Property from a private UK Collection, acquired directly from the artist in Baghdad circa 1950's

Exhibited:
National Museum of Modern Art, Baghdad, January 1968.

"She came to Iraq with a good eye and sense of proportion, and she loved what she saw here. You have to love to do good work" - Jewad Selim

The present lot is a rare and exceptional early composition by Lorna Selim executed in the inimitable style of the Baghdad Modern Art Group. Mixing traditional Iraqi motifs with a modernist visual language, Lorna, like her illustrious husband Jewad, weaved form of "folk modernism" which was both vernacular and universal.

Focusing on the florid landscape of downtown Baghdad, Selim's compositions are populated with the humorous and extravagant characters encountered in everyday life. Light hearted and boisterous, the "Lemon Sellers" is in part a stylistically sophisticated example of a burgeoning modernist movement in Iraq and in part a playful take on life in streets of Baghdad.

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- Modern & Contemporary Middle Eastern Art