Untitled

Acrylic & charcoal on linen canvas, 83”x70”

If you are interested in purchasing this painting, click on this link to automatically email Salam Al-Rawi: salamny@gmail.com.

This painting alludes to an ancient Iraqi fable that’s sometimes told as a children’s bedtime story. It goes like this…

Although she already was in love with someone else, a young woman was kidnapped by a man who had also fallen in love with her. Her lover’s attempts to save her and kill this scoundrel were unsuccessful, even though he’d stabbed him repeatedly. Pretending to be in love with her captor, the girl got him to reveal the secret of his ‘eternal life’—his soul lived in a box buried in a bull’s leg. Armed with this knowledge, her lover located the bull, severed the leg, and opened the box. Inside was an ant that contained the kidnapper’s soul. You can imagine how this story ends.