A Polish Painter in Yemen [Archives:2000/18/Last Page]

For the second time Mrs. Barbara Goshu is holding her exhibition in Yemen tomorrow at the French Cultural Center. Mrs. Barbara Goshu is a well known Polish painter that almost all the world recognizes her works. She was born in 1941 in Cracow- Poland and studied in the Fine Arts School. She has been living in Ethiopia where her husband comes from, for almost 20 years. On the occasion of her visit to Yemen she held a press conference on Saturday at the Polish Embassy in Sana’a in which she highlighted the nature of her works and other related issues.
As a polish, she said that she had her own stand to all historical events Poland has gone through which she tries to depict in her works. “Horry” or “the Queen of Poland” or the “Mother of Poland.” is an example at point of her strong ties to the past of Poland. It is to this historical woman that the Polish used to go with their problems during wars and even peace. This picture was painted 13 years ago while she was an expectant mother. It was also the feeling of having a baby that inspired her to make this picture as to take care of the expected Polish-Ethiopian baby.
Among the pictures that are going to be exhibited tomorrow is one depicting herself as praying for the release of His Excellency Ambassador of Poland to Yemen when he was kidnapped and another showing the engagement of King Solomon and Queen Sheba.
Amongst the political changes occurring in the world she tries to find the most humanitarian values rather than portraying political heroes.
“With art,” she said “We are participating at the full level of the centuries as long as humanity exists. Artists, mostly present the very touch of the past and continue through the time of today,” she added.
Mrs. Barbara Goshu held her first exhibition in Yemen in 1998. Her second exhibition is held tomorrow at the French Cultural Center. She said that she was pleased to visit Yemen as much as possible during her life to enhance what the Polish Embassy was doing here to make the relationship between Yemenis
and Polish even closer and warmer.
She portrays things in Yemen that would be typical for any artist when visiting a country, to show the world the beauty and values of Yemen. Her artistic career extends over 45 years. “I can honestly say that there is no country in the world that does not have paintings of mine,” she said confidently.
As far as women concerned, she breaks all boundaries to touch their problems in a very optimistic way wherever they are. A few months ago she traveled to Ethiopia at the invitation of a group of woman painters to hold a group exhibition. She painted a picture of a very typical Ethiopian woman showing the impact of horror on Ethiopian women.
Painting for her is a way to give thanks to God for creating humanity and to give a special prayer to keep love and peace prevailing. It is to glorify God to Whom we all belong, in her own way, to pray for unity among the nations and for human peace.
She was very fascinated by the art she had seen. She admired the very strong traditional character of Yemenis.
“It is good and very easy to follow the new things occurring in the world and it is very nice, but the most important is to keep your roots. By knowing your roots and personality, the world will respect you. It is good to change but you must keep the roots of your fathers. I do not know if the personality of that artist who is not respecting his roots can be really be valuable. By showing our own personal values we do not only respect ourselves, we welcome others to know them as well,” she concluded.

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