Mohammed Ghani Hikmat

Mohammad Ghani Hikmat (April 20, 1929 – September 12, 2011) (محمد غني حكمت) was an Iraqi sculptor and artist credited with creating some of Baghdad's highest-profile sculptures and monuments and was known as the "Sheik of sculptors".

He is also known as an early member of Iraq's first 20th-century art groups, including Al-Ruwad (the Pioneers) and The Baghdad Modern Art Group; two groups that helped to bridge the gap between tradition and modern art.

Ghani was born in 1929 in the Kadhimiya neighbourhood of Baghdad.

As a young boy, he liked to mould objects out of clay that he found in his surroundings and his talent was soon noticed.

He joined Al-Ruwad (The Pioneers), Iraq's first art group, formed by Iraqi painter, Faiq Hassan in the 1930s; the Jama’et Baghdad lil Fen al-Hadith (Baghdad Group for Modern Art) in 1953 and the Al-Zawiya Group (The Angle or The Corners) in 1967.

These groups attempted to incorporate local phenomena into their artworks in a variety of ways.

The Pioneers group rejected the artificial atmosphere of the artist’s studio and encouraged artists to engage with the local landscape and traditional Iraqi life.

He graduated from the Fine Arts Institute in Baghdad in 1953, before completing his studies in 1957 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, Italy.

He spent seven years in Italy, where he also studied bronze casting at the Instituto di Zaka in Florence.

While in Rome, he sculpted the wooden gates for the Church of Testa di Lepre, becoming the first Muslim sculptor to produce work for the Catholic Church.

The King had been deposed and killed in a military coup in July 1958, and several coups followed culminating in the rise of the Ba'ath Party in 1968.

Ghani continued to work, teaching at the Institute of Fine Arts, the Academy of Fine Arts and at the Department of Architectural Engineering at Baghdad University.

Ghani was very active in Iraq's arts community, especially through his involvement in a number of art groups.

It provides a narrative of the 1958 Revolution of Iraq with references to Iraqi history using Assyrian and Babylonian wall-reliefs.

Between 1959 and 1961, Ghani worked as an assistant to his friend, sculptor, Jawad Saleem, on the project to erect the Nasb al-Hurriyah (Monument of Freedom) in Baghdad's Liberation Square (pictured).

Ghani's role was to cast the bronze figures for the monument.

On his return to Baghdad in 1961, he found a city that had undergone substantial change.

Following Saleem's premature death in 1961, Ghani assumed responsibility for completing the project.

The monument consists of 14 bronze castings, representing 25 figures on a travertine slab, raised 6 metres off the ground.

From 1969 when the Hashemite monarchy was overthrown and Iraq became a republic, Ghani executed a number of high profile public monuments which are now dotted around the city of Baghdad.

Many of Ghani's early sculptures were inspired by Iraqi folklore, especially characters from One Thousand and One Nights (widely known as the Tales of Arabian Nights).

During the 1980s, he completed one of the gates of the UNICEF building in Paris; the mural of the Great Arab Revolt in Amman and five different works in Bahrain, including a mural in an old mosque, large statues and fountains.

He was also instrumental in recovering many of Iraq's missing artworks, which were looted following the 2003 invasion.

During the 2003 war, and the overthrow of the Ba'ath government, Ghani left Baghdad for Amman in Jordan, where he continued to work.

Several years later, following his return to Baghdad, he discovered the Museum of Modern Art in ruins.

Some 8,500 paintings and sculptures had been looted.

In addition, some 150 artworks had been stolen from Ghani's own studio and public monuments such as his King Sharyhar, located on the banks of the Tigris, had been badly vandalised.

The occupying forces insisted on a voluntary return of stolen artworks, a stance which resulted in very few works being returned.

A few independent galleries purchased artworks with a view to returning them once a suitable national museum could be established but progress recovering the cultural assets was slow.

In around 2007, Ghani established a committee, the members of which included many respected Iraqi artists, with the objective of recovering stolen artworks.

Ghani not only led the committee, but also funded it personally; used his network of connections to secure additional funding and pleaded with private citizens to return artworks that were being held in private collections.

His early works were figurative and included statues of Sinbad, the Sailor; the 10th-century poet, Al-Mutanabbi; the first Abbasid Caliph, Abu-Ja'afar Mansur (in stone); Hammurabi (in bronze) and Gilgamesh.

As he matured, his work became increasingly abstract, but he never lost sight of the need to reference Iraq's ancient art traditions through the use of Arabic script, geometric designs, and Sumerian architectural features.

By 2010, some 1,500 of the most important works had been returned, and Ghani's committee was directly responsible for recovering 150 of the more important works.

In addition, the statue, Motherhood by Jawad Saleem, stolen from Ghani's own studio, was returned.

The Baghdad Modern Art Group wanted to connect modern art with traditional art of the 13th-century (in the manner of the Baghdad School).

The philosophy behind Iraq's early art groups was the desire to connect Iraq's ancient art traditions with international trends in a way that contributed to a truly national Iraqi visual language.

Ghani adopted this philosophy by consciously including Assyrian and Babylonian architectural detail, geometric patterns (Arabesque) and Arabic calligraphy in his sculptures.

In so doing, artists, like Ghani, helped to synthesise heritage and modernity and to reassert a sense of national identity.

The sculpture featured on the 10,000 dinar bank note for 2013-2015.