Baya Mahieddine

[Algeria] (b 1931/d 1998)

"Femme et enfant en bleu"[1947]

"Baya Mahieddine or Fatima Haddad (real name) was born in 1931 at Fort de l’eau (today’s Bordj- el-Kiffan), and by the age of five, both her parents had died, so she was raised by her grandmother. At the age of eleven, Marguerite Caminat, a French woman residing in Algiers, stepped in as Baya’s protector. (..) In 1947 Marguerite, who was well connected in the literary and art worlds, was visited by the French art dealer Aimé Maeght who, later that year, presented Baya’s work in a solo exhibition in his gallery. André Breton wrote the preface to the catalogue of Baya's exhibition. (..) After the time in Paris, Baya spent some time in Vallauris working on pottery and returned to Algeria where she married El Hadj Mahfoud Mahieddine, a famous musician (.. ) from 1953 to 1963 she paused her Artistic career to devote herself to the Mothering of 6 children... (..) In her gouaches dominated by vibrant colors, she often paints silhouettes of women and their clothes or unique representations of flora and fauna, and portray unusual animals such as flying rabbits and camel-sized birds that might emerge from Scheherazade’s stories, from "The Thousand and One Nights" Arab stories.. (..) In 1963 she resumed painting, always exhibiting both new and old work in Algiers and in Paris, (..)"

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Biography : Wikipedia

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Photo : www.news.artnet.com

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Algeria 1969 "Mother and child Protection" (1) [Photo] Sc(430)

Algeria 1971 "25th Anniversary of UNICEF" (1) [Photo] Sc(470)

Algeria 1989 "Child Welfare" (1) [Photo] Sc(B105)