Video of the day -- Hiya Hiya -- visions of the great barrier
This video fascinates me partly for the contrast it exemplifies. The imagery is from the western part of the Sahara, the vast barrier of wasteland separating the Mediterranean world from the very different world of Sub-Saharan Africa -- perhaps the most desolate large region on Earth, after Antarctica. Set against that is the luxuriant beauty of Khaled's voice and of the Arabic script spelling out the words of the song. Arab culture is known for its love of poetry and calligraphy -- is there perhaps something about desert cultures that seeks refuge from the barrenness of the physical environment in the richness of language?
Previous videos by Khaled are here and here.
posted by Infidel753 at 1:19 PM
2 Comments:
Might I suggest that a reason for the incredible development of calligraphy in Arabic speaking cultures is the forbidding by Islam of the portrayal of human figures, thus leaving artists to pursue whatever means they could find to express their art?
There have been times when that prohibition was ignored, but yes, there's probably a connection.
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