There are fundamental changes on the horizon concerning the nature, significance and role of images in both new and traditional media. These transformations occurred within the context of significant technological advancements that led to the increasing influence of the digital image. Such mounting influence of digital image is attributed to its capacity for rapid dissemination via the internet. In addition, photography and imaging have advanced beyond their traditional limitations, and images can now be generated through computer applications. This evolution has resulted in the emergence of a new form of creative digital art.
Although digital art first appeared in the 1970s as a method of developing digital photographs, its familiarity and spread in the Middle East is more recent. Digital art’s rapid popularity is accredited to its ability to express regional social and political issues.
The last six years have witnessed a surge in this non-traditional form of art given its effectiveness as a tool to convey political and social views during the time of the Arab Spring, which its ramifications still linger to this day.
A Different Pattern
Digital art is considered a form of technological expression based on an artist’s capacity to innovate and express humanistic thoughts via digital tools. The tools used include a variety of machines such as computers, electronic tablets and high-quality cell phones.
The methods and applications of digital art vary tremendously, and show increasing levels of complexity, from relatively simple graphic images and infographic designs, to more complex digital caricatures and satire. Its applications can further include sophisticated digital designs expressing characteristics of traditional art, such as realist, surrealist and abstract styles.
The utilization of such art varies depending on its end purpose. For example, government entities and companies often make use of infographics for educating and explaining different systems, as well as comparing and evaluating performance. Social movements seek to use artistic digital imagery to express their own ideas.
Diverse Uses
With the spread of technology in the Middle East, digital art has become a common tool to rapidly achieve certain goals. As mentioned previously, this is partially due to its nature or rapid dissemination and accessibility across various online platforms.
Early producers of digital art in the region arose in response to a region rife with dynamic political, social and economic interactions imposed by the Arab Spring. The uprisings served as a form of inspiration for some of the most powerful examples of such art. The art itself was utilized to achieve the following:
1. Shedding light on suffering populations: Over the course of the Arab Spring, digital artists were able to document people’s pain and sufferings, more specifically focusing on Syrian, Egyptian and Tunisian revolutions. The documentation of the Arab Spring through digital art was not only conducted by artists from within the region, but also by foreigners. Slogans from the Egyptian and Tunisian uprisings appeared in many digital art pieces.
One of the most prominent concerns of the Syrian revolution’s digital art is to reveal the suffering and pain of the Syrians living through a state of civil war. The comic book “Madaya Mom”, a project produced in a collaboration between ABC News and Marvel Comics, is one of the strongest ways in which digital art portrays the suffering of besieged Syrian people. The comic was presented as an online web-comic, comprised of 30 images chronicling the suffering of a Syrian family from the city of Madaya. The majority of the images are drawn in black and white.
2. Changing negative perceptions about refugees: In light of the anti-refugees campaigns by some of the conservative western politicians and western media outlets, two projects utilizing digital art have come to the forefront to counter such campaigns. These projects aim to improve the image of refugees and to change theimposed stereotypes. The first of these projects is the mobile exhibition, “I Am the Syrian,” headed by the artist Tammam Azzam. Azzam has taken the exhibition on the road for three years, during which he has sought to display the suffering of those displaced from Syria, and highlight the commitment of Syrians to their country and their intentions to return to it. He does so through images and illustrations showing the destruction of homes in Syria. One such image, titled “The Blessed Journey”, shows balloons lifting a shattered home in Damascus and carrying it over other cities and capitals, such as Beirut, London, Paris, New York, and Geneva.
A second such project is a social media celebrity campaign initiated by Syrian artist Moustafa Jacoub, an activist living outside Syria, via the hashtag “#I_AM_SYRIAN”. The campaign sought to utilize visuals to reduce animus against Syrian refugees by designing posters of prominent celebrities of Syrian origin. Such celebrities included Shadia Habbal, professor of solar terrestrial physics at the Institute of Mathematical and Physical Sciences at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth. The campaign further portrayed the astronaut Muhammed Faris, director Moustapha Akkad, and Steve Jobs.
3. Preserving national identity: Many initiatives have sought to use digital technology for promoting a strengthened sense of belonging to society and to a homeland. A digital media forum titled “Shoof” held its fourth conference in Riyadh on October 23, 2016. Within the conference, seven artistic digital initiatives were developed to bolster the sense of national affiliation to the Saudi society.
4. Emphasizing the importance of real social communication: Some producers of digital art have been keen to draw attention to the significance of preserving real communication between the individual and society, given the increased dependence on social media for two-party virtual interaction. The artists express how technology may facilitate individual isolation through issues such as the breakup of families, and the lack of communication and its potential implications. These ideas were put into practice by foreign artists and spread widely around social media sites. Recently, they have become Arabized through their focus on traditional aspects of Arab life.
In conclusion, one can state that using digital art in the service of social and political causes in the Middle East is off to a strong start, in light of its rapid spread across social media. This might enhance such art’s capacity to be utilize for other means in the near future.
