Samar Yahya



SAAD SEDAWY, a caricaturist, began his journey of discovery in early age — his artistic talent progressed from poetry and writing to caricature while he was a teenager. His first published comics were in a booklet of crosswords and that was his springboard of success. Since then he has worked for famous publishing houses in Egypt and the Arab world.



His main characteristic is to always work with a spirit of competition and excellence, out of this his experiences are determinate to successive phases; studying all aspects of the work as a whole, searching for a feature of identity to bridge the gap between the world of fiction and reality to reach a complete work of art.



One of the main projects in his career is documenting the Egyptian heritage in  “Egyptian Panorama Tales” documenting fairy tales and folk epics in addition to some old movies in Egyptian heritage in caricature paintings. “The beginning came very spontaneously, then it went on to studying and analyzing. First I documented old and the might-be-forgotten radio lyrics and even some old movies like “Some of Fear” and “The Trilogy” by the famous novelist and Noble Prize Laureate Naguib Mahfouz,” Sedawy said.

Sedawy also used plastic art to document and transform the first Egyptian video clip named “Who Asked You To Live In Our Alley?” with all its specific details and symbols.



“Operetta and songs of ancient Egyptian is the pulse of heritage. We listened to them when we were young and were brought up on them and their vocabulary, which were comical and some other times educational.

The song and the melody are the keyword to commemorate the work of art for the next generations,” Sedawy stressed.



“Tahrir Guernica is not an interpretation of Picasso’s famous Guernica, yet it is the outcome of interaction with painful reality at the time of revolution. I portrayed many segments of people, a lot of blood of victims and martyrs. The name of the painting jumped to my mind when I was looking to it before signing off the painting,” Sedawy said.



When working for an exhibition, Sedawy always paints with a specific aim in his mind. His last exhibition in Jeddah documented the old and traditional items and games that are almost extinct. Sedawy has participated in many local and international exhibitions. His recent works are a play for children and paintings of a collection of colloquial poems.

Speaking about the things that formed his character and then developed his artistic sense, Sedawy said: “The balcony in my family’s house was like the gateway to the world because of its intermediate location between ancient Egypt and a classy district. I used to watch different types of people, street vendors with their rhythms announcing their presence and products, traditional café, boot polisher, workshops and licorice seller. All these factors had their impact on me and were the first step on my way to the world of art and caricature.”