THE JOURY COLLECTION
The Joury Collection is the private art collection of husband-and-wife duo, the architect Ali Mousawi and the artist Maysaloun Faraj. Comprising works by Iraq’s notable artists, amassed over 50 years since the early 1970s, their dream to design and build a museum in Baghdad to house this collection sadly came to a halt due to the ongoing instability in the country.
Sunset on Dijla: Fal’lah and Wife 49x40cm Coloured pencil and watercolour on paper Baghdad 1986
Signed ‘الى عزيزتي ميسلون، المخلصه نزيهه سليم'
I chose this work to kickstart The Joury Collection display, as it holds a special place in my heart! We visited Baghdad for the Biennale 1988, in which I was a participating artist. We were generously hosted at Al-Mansour Melia Hotel, which became a hub buzzing with social, intellectual, and artistic engagement! The highlight for us, however, was when one morning, we received a knock on our hotel room door, to find none other than my former art teacher at Baghdad High School, Ms Neziha Selim! She had a rolled paper in one hand and coloured pencils in the other. ‘O my God, ‘Sit’ Neziha, please come in’! She sat in the chair, I on the bed across! She un-rolled the paper onto her lap and immediately started to draw the finishing touches! Ecstatic, I asked ‘But Miss Neziha, how did you remember me after all these years!?’ She looked straight in my eyes and said ‘How can I forget my beautiful talented student!?, signed the drawing, handed it to me, and left! I was moved to tears!
In every Iraqi garden however, Jouri roses (ورد جوري) continue to bloom. This popular flower is known for its sweet fragrance, vibrant colours and ability to withstand Iraq’s scorching heat during its summer months. The Joury rose represents a part of the country's cultural heritage and is considered a symbol of beauty and romance in Iraqi culture.
Maysaloun further notes: “My ‘Bibi’ (grandmother) Zahra, used to call me ‘Jouri Warid’! This forever filled my heart with joy, love and beauty and made me feel very special. Ali and I saw in the word Jouri, a befitting title for our collection, which we look forward to sharing with every Iraqi household, albeit virtually at present, if not in an actual museum in the motherland sometime in the future.
Ali Mousawi is one of Iraq’s leading architects in the 1970s. Amongst numerous important buildings he designed, he was particularly known for his innovative style of Baghdadi homes (exceeding 500). He collaborated with many prominent Iraqi artists of the day, incorporating their work in his building designs. Ali and his late brother Sami Mousawi were also the architects of what was later named, the Saddam Art Centre. His vast connections, not only with distinguished artist of the time, but also with collectors and pronounced figures in the community, facilitated for the start and core of the Joury Collection. With the onset of the Iraq-Iran war, he moved with his family to London in 1982, re-established his architectural practice AMBS (ambsarchitects.com) where he continues to work today.
Besides her artistic accomplishment, Maysaloun Faraj’s love for Iraq culminated in a ground-breaking project bringing Iraqi art to the fore. This encompassed a major exhibition tour (UK/USA 2001-3), the first ever website showcasing Iraqi art collectively (incia.co.uk) and the seminal publication Strokes of Genius: Contemporary Iraqi Art of which she is editor (Saqi Books 2001). Together with Ali Mousawi she co-founded the Aya Gallery in London (ayagallery.co.uk) to show case the best of contemporary and modern Iraqi Art (2002-10). In 2008 Faraj was invited to serve as a judge for the first Arab Art and Culture Award in the UK. After years dedicated to ‘putting Iraqi Art on the map’, gaining the interest of museums, collectors, and international auction houses, she decided that the time was due to focus back on her own artwork.
“It is our respect and love of Iraq and her artists that has led us on this fascinating journey which culminated not only in The Joury Collection, which we hold with immense pride, but also with the many important exhibitions that we have painstakingly presented throughout the years, here in London and abroad and of course the SOG publication and Ayagallery.”
Maysaloun Faraj & Ali Mousawi