MARGO VEILLON | METAMORPHOSE

Collection of the Artist, Cairo

Green Art Gallery, Dubai

Margo Veillon was born in Cairo to a Swiss father and Austrian mother. Veillon spent her secondary education at boarding school in Zurich, Switzerland. She then returned to Cairo in1924 to pursue a career in art and spent much of her artistic career capturing the vitality and movement of daily life in Egypt.

Veillon produced work in a variety of graphic media, pen and ink, watercolour, pencil and crayon – though, she was perhaps best known for her watercolour paintings that depicted the life and landscape of the Egyptian countryside, as well as its street scenes. Further to this, a notable body of her work moves away from the vitality inherent to living scenes and into abstraction.

Although she lived part of her life in Europe, it is clear that Egypt captured her artistic spirit and was the life force behind her works and inspiration for her artistic innovation. With characteristic subtle humour and an ability to imbue vitality in brushwork, she captured the essence of moments in only a few strokes.

Veillon was one of Egypt's best-loved artists. Spanning seventy-five years of a productive career, as represented in the donation of what was in effect, the estate of her works, to the American University in Cairo.