Ibrahim El-Salahi

About

Ibrahim El-Salahi, born on September 5, 1930, in Omdurman, Sudan, is a pioneering Sudanese painter recognized as a key figure in African and Arab modernism. His father ran a Quranic school where he first practiced Arabic calligraphy. He studied at the School of Design at Gordon Memorial College in Khartoum and later received a scholarship to the Slade School of Fine Art in London from 1954 to 1957. Returning to Sudan after independence in 1956, he co-founded the Khartoum School, blending Arabic calligraphy, African motifs, and Western modernist influences into a unique Hurufiyya style. He served as Director of Culture for the Sudanese government in the 1970s.[1][2][3][4][5]

Hurufiyya modernism integrating Arabic calligraphy, African motifs, and Western abstraction