Zakaria Ahmed Al-Zaini

Personal data

Nickname: Zakaria El-Zeini
Date of birth: 3/12/1932
Place of birth: Cairo
Date of death: 15/7/1993
Specialization: photography
E-mail : --

school grade

Diploma from the College of Fine Arts in Cairo, Department of Painting, 1960
Diploma of the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice, Department of Painting, 1964
Diploma of the Academy of Fine Arts, Pravna, Department of Mural Painting, 1966

membership

A member of the diggers group, El Torcio in Venice.
A member of the Bisontian diggers group in Venice.
Member of the Egyptian Drilling Society in Cairo.
Member of the Alumni Association of the College of Fine Arts in Cairo.
- Member of the Atelier Group for Artists and Writers in Cairo.
- Member of the Fine Artists Syndicate and member of its first board of directors.

Jobs and occupations undertaken by the artist

Vice Dean of the College of Fine Arts in Cairo and Professor of Painting at the College
Head of the photography department
Head of the Painting Department at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Minya on assignment

The places where the artist lived

Mrs. Zainab

Special exhibitions

Bevel Gallery Acualamaza, Venice, 1964
Gallery Internationale, Venice, 1965
San Stefano Gallery, Venice, 1966
Numero Gallery, Venice, 1968
Akhenaten Hall, Cairo, 1969
- Hall of the Czechoslovak Cultural Center, Cairo, 1970
Akhenaten Hall, Cairo, 1971
- Center for Foreign Diplomats, Cairo, 1971
- Hall of the Soviet Cultural Center, Cairo, 1975
- Hall of the Soviet Cultural Center, Alexandria, 1976
- Aida Sadeq Gallery, Giza, 1979-1981
- Hall of the Faculty of Fine Arts, Cairo, 1980
Port Said Culture Palace - Port Said 1981
- Akhenaten Hall No. 1, Cairo, February 1984
An exhibition of his works in the hangars, 1993.
- Exhibition at Safrakhan Gallery, Zamalek, 2007.
- Exhibition (Searching for Beauty) at Safar Khan Gallery in Zamalek, February 2017.
- Exhibition (Language of Silence) at Safar Khan Hall, Zamalek, October 2018.
- An exhibition entitled (Dream Travel) in (Salah Taher) Hall at the Cairo Opera House, May 2022.
- An exhibition entitled (Inscriptions on the Wall of the Heart) at (Dhaa) Gallery of Culture and Arts in Mohandessin, January 2023.

Local group exhibitions

An exhibition of his works in Akhenaten (18 artists from the sixties)
- Exhibition 'Contemporary Portrait Art in Egypt' at the Italian Cultural Center in Zamalek, December 1985.
- Exhibition (The Bride) at Karma Ibn Hana Center, Ahmed Shawky Museum, January 2007.
- Cairo Salon (56) for Fine Arts, Palace of Arts, March 2013.
- Exhibition at Safar Khan Gallery, Zamalek, June 2017.
- Exhibition (Treasures of the Fourth Pyramid) at the Art Hall of Al-Ahram Foundation, downtown, August 2017.
- Exhibition (Your Wall Art) at Safar Khan Gallery, Zamalek, June 2018.
- An exhibition entitled (From Mukhtar to Attraction) at Art Talks Gallery in Zamalek, December 2019.
Mobdeoun Khalidon exhibition at Dhi Gallery, Mohandessin, January 2021.
- The third exhibition entitled (Arabic Selections) at the (Dhi) Gallery of Arts and Culture in Mohandessin, May 2021.
- Exhibition (Collectibles) at (Ibdaa) Art Gallery in Zamalek, July 2021.
- Exhibition (Generations) at (Hala Art Gallery) in Nasr City, September 2021.
- An exhibition entitled (Selections) in the Gallery (Ibdaa) in Zamalek, March 2022.
- An exhibition entitled (Memory of the Cairo Atelier) at the Cairo Atelier, May 2022.
- An exhibition entitled (Arabic Selections), the fourth in the (Dhi) Gallery of Arts and Culture in Mohandessin, June 2022.
- An exhibition entitled (Creative Immortals) at (Dhaa) Gallery of Culture and Arts in Zamalek and Mohandessin, September 2022.
- An exhibition entitled (From Mukhtar to Attraction) at Art Talks Gallery in Zamalek, October 2022.
- An exhibition entitled (Arabic Selections 2023) at the (Dhi) Gallery for Arts and Culture in Mohandessin and Zamalek, July 2023.

International group exhibitions / overseas fairs

Alexandria Biennale 1962
Foreign Academies Exhibition, Rome 1963
Annual exhibition at Acualamaza Gallery, Venice, 1963-1964
The International Gallery, Venice, 1963
- Gallery Internationale, Venice, 1965
Treviso Town Hall, 1966
For the sake of Palestine, Padua 1966
- Exhibition of the Ministry of Tourism, Brussels, 1967
Alexandria International Biennale 1968-1970-1974
Ibiza International Biennale, Spain 1968
Rijeka International Biennale of Painting, Yugoslavia, 1970
Sao Paulo Biennale 1972
Contemporary Egyptian Art, Manila, 1973
Contemporary Egyptian Art, Sudan, 1974
Contemporary Egyptian Art, Barry, 1974
Contemporary Egyptian Art, Mexico, 1979
Contemporary Egyptian Art, China, 1980
Contemporary Egyptian Art, Yugoslavia, 1982

Technical visits

Venice, Yugoslavia, Baghdad, Kuwait
Italy, France, Argentina, China, Sudan

Missions and grants

- Mission to Italy (Venice and then Ravna) from 1926 to 1966.

Technical tasks assigned to him and general contributions

Participated in mural painting (mosaic) in the subway
Participated in the 6th of October Panorama - Al-Ahram newspaper building

International awards

First prize (painting) Alexandria Biennale 1991

Private collectibles

Private groups of people in Egypt and the Arab world
Europe - The Americas

Official collectibles

Museum of Modern Art in Cairo
Ministry of Culture
Museum of the Faculty of Fine Arts in Cairo and Alexandria

The influences that were reflected on the artist intellectually and artistically

When I saw his paintings on `flowers` in his last exhibition a few months ago, the spectrum of paintings of some of our great photographers that revolved around the same subject floated in my memory, and I found that everything that seemed incomplete to me in their paintings was completed in his paintings. Shortcomings, his paintings combined in a delicate balance between complementary binaries that combined structure and poetic sense, between hot frankness in color and cold frankness, between clashes of broad silhouettes and bubbles of light spread between preserving the formative basis of the painting of the Biology Age and getting rid of the gossip of its details between extreme ingenuity and sensitivity.
When a friend asked me about my opinion, I said without fear of doing preference or aversion to it, perhaps for the first time, that Zayti’s flowers are the best flowers in Egyptian painting. Other faces appeared through his creative journey, oscillating between joy and sadness, between richness and austerity
With its diversity, it formed an aesthetic and moral discourse that weaves its existence from the social reality. Perhaps Zakaria Al-Zeini was the first to draw attention with his art to the neglected things with his waste paintings and did not paint them in order to alienate us from them. What we see in the expressive drawings in the German school and that we know about the Greek theater imply the presence of a hidden or latent reality that contradicts it. As for Al-Zayni, the mask was unified. And if we suffice with his paintings of waste, we say that he is clear.. So which of them was Zakaria Al-Zeini? The answer comes from where he was not an artist and a one-dimensional person. He used to share people’s sorrows and joys. He used to get angry at what deserves anger, especially what hurts human dignity. He did not paint those masks to invite us to despair, but to warn us of it. Had he been desperate, he would not have offered us his bright flowers, nor would he have turned the wastes of the road into pearls.
Mahmoud Baksheesh