01 Work, The Art of War, Sliman Mansour's Prison, with footnotes

Sliman Mansour

Prison, c. 1982

Oil on canvas

71 x 60 cm

Contemporary Art Platform, Kuwait

Prison (1982) depicts five men, their hands cuffed behind their back and their heads covered so they cannot see. They are huddled together, back to back, confined within the walls of a prison. Most likely Palestinian and although faceless, the men appear strong, youthful and resilient in their stance. Yet melancholy undertones run throughout, as the future for this generation appears desolate and bleak. The oppression has caused for a fractured identity. More on this painting

Sliman Mansour ( born 1947), is a Palestinian painter, considered an important figure among contemporary Palestinian artists. Mansour is considered an artist of intifada whose work captures to the cultural concept of sumud. Palestinian artist and scholar Samia Halaby has identified Mansour as part of the Liberation Art Movement and cites his important work as an artist and cultural practitioner before and after the Intifada.

During the Intifada, Mansour was part of the "New Visions" group of Palestinian artists that included Tayseer Barakat, Vera Tamari, and Nabil Anani. This collective turned to earthworks and mixed media and assemblage using materials derived from the Palestinian environment in order to boycott Israeli art supplies in protest of the ongoing occupation. In 1988 he made a series of four paintings on destroyed Palestinian villages, the four villages being Yibna, Yalo, Imwas and Bayt Dajan.

He is a co-author of Both Sides of Peace: Israeli and Palestinian Political Poster Art, published in 1998 by the Contemporary Art Museum with University of Washington Press. More on Sliman Mansour

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