T he Egyptian Laila El Sadda is part of the Art Trio, a collective of women artists that also includes al-Assmaa Taki Deen and Mariam Mahdy. El Sadda’s art reflects her practice, showing the intimacy of women’s collectives and sociability. Her paintings depict groups of women with large, Horus-like (or khamsa/ hand of Fatima–like) eyes, looking out of the frame with clear, serene gazes. As a focal point, the eyes center the paintings as they seem to center the figures. A series of El Sadda’s recent works show women pressed close together, their arms wrapped protectively around one another in friendship and solidarity. On a Facebook page where she showsmuch of her work, El Sadda (2019b) writes, “When women support each other, incredible things happen.” In Cairo West Magazine she reflects on the importance of social media for “connecting people” through her art and “communicat[ing] the message” (El Sadda 2019a). Other paintings show women gathered around a commensal meal, a mother wrapping her arms around children, two women facing each other, communing. The painting featured on this issue’s cover portrays four women—an arrangement that El Sadda says she never tires of reproducing, which evokes an Egyptian reconfiguration of Eugène Delacroix’s (four)Women of Algiers in Their Apartment in ways suggested by Assia Djebar. Djebar critiqued Delacroix’s objectification of Algerian women shown in the intimacy of their home, but El Sadda shows selfpossessedEgyptianwomen in control of their own representation, staring out at the viewer, not objects but their own subjects. El Sadda shows what Djebar calls “sistercompanions”—sister-companions not to men but to each other. “We must look for a restoration of the conversation between women,” Djebar (1992: 149–50) writes. But in El Sadda’s paintings those conversations seem never to have been severed. El Sadda uses “scraps from old notebooks, newspapers and magazines” on

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封面艺术概念

埃及人莱拉·埃尔·萨达 (Laila El Sadda) 是艺术三重奏组的成员，该组合由女性艺术家组成，其中还包括 al-Assmaa Taki Deen 和 Mariam Mahdy。El Sadda 的艺术反映了她的实践，展现了女性集体的亲密感和社交能力。她的画作描绘了一群有着荷鲁斯般（或 khamsa/法蒂玛之手）般大眼睛的女性，用清晰、宁静的凝视向外看。作为焦点，眼睛使绘画居中，就像它们似乎使人物居中一样。埃尔萨达 (El Sadda) 最近的一系列作品展示了女性紧紧靠在一起，她们的双臂保护性地相互缠绕，以示友谊和团结。El Sadda（2019b）在一个展示她大量作品的 Facebook 页面上写道：“当女性相互支持时，不可思议的事情就会发生。” 在 Cairo West 杂志中，她反思了社交媒体对于通过她的艺术和“传达信息”“联系人们”的重要性（El Sadda 2019a）。其他画作展示了女性聚集在共餐周围，母亲搂着孩子，两个女人面对面交流。本期封面上的这幅画描绘了四位女性——埃尔萨达说她从不厌倦再现这种安排，这唤起了埃及人对尤金德拉克罗瓦的（四）阿尔及尔妇女在他们的公寓中以 Assia Djebar 建议的方式进行的重构。杰巴尔批评德拉克罗瓦对阿尔及利亚女性的客体化表现在他们家的亲密关系中，但埃尔萨达表现出自负的埃及女性控制自己的表现，盯着观众，不是物体而是她们自己的主体。El Sadda 展示了 Djebar 所谓的“姐妹伴侣”——姐妹伴侣不是对男人，而是对彼此。“我们必须寻求恢复女性之间的对话，”Djebar (1992: 149-50) 写道。但在埃尔萨达的画作中，这些对话似乎从未中断过。El Sadda 使用“旧笔记本、报纸和杂志的碎片”