Basil Alkazzi
{{Short description|Kuwaiti-born British painter (born 1938)}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Basil Alkazzi
| native_name = باسل القاضي
| native_name_lang = ar
| other_names = Basil al-Kazzi
| birth_name = Basil Hamed Alkazzi
| birth_date = {{birth year and age|1938}}
| birth_place = at sea near Kuwait
| education = Central School of Art
| movement = Metaphysical painting
| website = {{URL|https://www.BasilAlkazzi.com/}}
}}
Basil Alkazzi ({{Langx|ar|باسل القزي}}; born 1938), is Kuwait-born British visual artist, of Saudi Arabian–Kuwaiti heritage. As a painter he is known for metaphysical and spiritual abstract paintings.{{Cite news |date=July 13, 2014 |title=Beautiful paintings explore the spiritual at Sheldon |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/lincoln-journal-star-beautiful-paintings/149995284/ |access-date=2024-06-24 |work=Lincoln Journal Star |pages=D6 |via=Newspapers.com}}{{Cite news |last=Hays |first=Jim |date=1989-03-13 |title=Artist seeks to explore spiritual themes |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/springfield-news-sun-artist-seeks-to-exp/149995461/ |access-date=2024-06-24 |work=Springfield News-Sun |pages=3 |via=Newspapers.com}} He is a supporter of emerging painters through numerous awards and scholarships. Alkazzi has lived in London and New York City.
Biography
Basil Alkazzi was born in 1938, on a ship in the sea traveling from Kuwait to Britain.{{Cite web |title=Through color and biomorphic forms, artwork at Rider University evokes the spirit |url=https://whyy.org/articles/through-color-and-biomorphic-forms-artwork-at-rider-university-evokes-the-spirit/ |access-date=2024-06-24 |website=WHYY-TV PBS |language=en-US}} His father Hamed Ali Alkazzi, was a merchant and from an Arab family.{{Cite book |last=Wykes-Joyce |first=Max |title=The Art of Basil Alkazzi |publisher=Drian Galleries |year=1982 |pages=5}} In early childhood, he was artistic and interested in the arts. Alkazzi attended the Central School of Art in London (now Central Saint Martins, a constituent college of the University of the Arts London).{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9j5UAAAAMAAJ |title=Art and Artists |date=1984 |publisher=Hansom Books |pages=34 |language=en}}
In the 1960s, Alkazzi worked with the human figure as a mythological and symbolic subject; and after painting for many years, the figure appeared to stretch out into the skyline or became unrecognizable forms.{{Cite book |last1=Alkazzi |first1=Basil |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uNFKngEACAAJ |title=Basil Alkazzi: An Odyssey of Dreams : a Decade of Paintings 2003-2012 |last2=Kuspit |first2=Donald Burton |author-link2=Donald Kuspit |date=2013 |publisher=Scala |isbn=978-1-85759-876-6 |language=en}}
{{Quote box
| quote = “pure forms, geomorphic and biomorphic, became emblematic of spirit in action [of Alkazzi's work]— pure spirit in Kandinsky’s sense of being possessed by ‘inner necessity’…”
| author = – Donald Kuspit
| align = right
| width = 30%
}}
He had a solo exhibition in 1989 at the Springfield Art Center in Springfield, Illinois. His solo exhibition, "An Odyessy of Dreams" (2014) was curated by Judith K. Brodsky and displayed at the Sheldon Museum of Art in Lincoln, Nebraska.
In 1986, he established the Basil Alkazzi Scholarship at the Royal College of Art in London; and a year later in 1987, established the Basil H. Alkazzi Award for young and emerging American painters. Through the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA), Alkazzi established in 2010 two biennial awards.
Collections and archives
His work is in museum collections, including at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City;{{Cite web |title=Basil Alkazzi, Transmutation III |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/486710 |access-date=2024-06-24 |website=The Metropolitan Museum of Art |language=en}} the Art Institute of Chicago;{{Cite web |date=1938 |title=Basil Alkazzi |url=https://www.artic.edu/artists/113868/basil-alkazzi |access-date=2024-06-24 |website=The Art Institute of Chicago |language=en}} the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum at Washington University in St. Louis;{{Cite web |title=Voyage into Remembrance |url=https://www.kemperartmuseum.wustl.edu/collection/search-results/wu-1998-13-basil-alkazzi-kuwaiti-b-1938-voyage-into-remembrance-1991/search/ac-technique:drawing/sort_by/date/order/desc |access-date=2024-06-24 |website=Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum}} the Neuberger Museum of Art in Purchase, New York;{{Cite web |title=Artist Provides Major Gift to Fund NEU Acquisitions |url=https://www.purchase.edu/live/news/5208-artist-provides-major-gift-to-fund-neu |access-date=2024-06-24 |website=Purchase College |language=en}} and at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City.{{Cite web |title=Basil Alkazzi |url=https://art.nelson-atkins.org/people/6404/basil-alkazzi;jsessionid=03828784907995D548AC5CADE6047ACB |access-date=2024-06-24 |website=The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art |language=en}} His artist files can be found at the Philadelphia Museum of Art Library and Archives, and the Smithsonian American Art and Portrait Gallery Library.
See also
{{portal|Biography|Kuwait|Visual arts}}
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Alkazzi, Basil}}
Category:20th-century Kuwaiti people
Category:21st-century Kuwaiti people
Category:Kuwaiti contemporary artists
Category:Kuwaiti emigrants to the United Kingdom
Category:British people of Saudi Arabian descent