Fahrelnissa Zeid

(Turkey, 07/01/1901 - 05/09/1991)

Born Fahrünnisa Şakir in 1901 to an elite Ottoman family, Zeid’s father was a prominent intellectual and diplomat who raised her in an environment steeped in literature, music, intellect and art, and encouraged the pursuit of her creative expression when she began painting and drawing at the age of 14.

After beginning her artistic education in 1928 at the Académie Ranson in Paris, she returned to Istanbul the following year and enrolled in classes at the Academy of Fine Arts for Women in Istanbul, becoming one of its first female students.

In 1934, Zeid married Prince Zeid bin Hussein of Iraq which propelled her into an international life that took her to Berlin, London, Paris and Baghdad. Although, far from confining her artistic ambitions, her diplomatic role expanded her exposure to global artistic currents and intellectual circles which enabled her to develop a distinctive Abstract language that combined the scale and dynamism of Abstract Expressionism with the structural rigour of Cubism and the ornamental complexity of Byzantine mosaics and Islamic geometry.

Both aristocrat and a radical Modernist, Zaid’s monumental Abstract paintings suggest both cosmic expansion and inner psychological states, reflecting her belief that Abstraction could convey profound emotional and spiritual truths. Her use of bold chromatic contrasts and intricate networks of line further challenges the notion of Abstraction as detached or purely formal. Instead, her paintings assert a deeply embodied, experiential vision through which she was able to deeply engage with Western Modernism while remaining firmly rooted in the cultural traditions of the Middle East.

Alongside Abstraction, portraiture remained a central thread throughout Zeid’s career. She painted family members, diplomats, artists and members of royal households with an unflinching psychological acuity. After settling in Amman following the 1958 Iraqi revolution, Zeid returned more fully to figurative work, often rendering her subjects against stark backgrounds, bestowing an austere intensity that underscores her enduring interest in the human presence.

In 1976, Zeid founded the Royal National Jordanian Institute for Fine Arts, where she taught and mentored a new generation of artists with a pedagogical approach that emphasised artistic freedom, cultural dialogue and the importance of personal vision. Despite periods of relative obscurity in the Western canon during her lifetime, Zeid remained unwavering in her commitment to painting as a means of transcending political, cultural social and personal boundaries.

Since the early twenty-first century, Zeid’s work has received renewed international attention through major retrospectives and scholarly reassessment, leading to her recognition as a pioneering figure who expanded the possibilities of modern Abstraction and challenged Eurocentric narratives of art history.

Image: Fahrelnissa Zeid, Untitled (c.1950s). Oil paint on canvas, 182 x 222 cm. Tate, U.K.