Global artistic icon .. “Fine” documents 1,200 species of “Asiri Cat” lines

For 33 years, the Saudi plastic artist Ibrahim Al -Ma’ai documented the art of “Asiri Cat” from his traditional sites, which were engraved by the hands of women more than 7 decades ago professionally and a high artistic sense on the walls of archaeological houses.
And he confirms that his weekly schedule for three decades was not without visiting a village in East, West, North or in the center of Asir region; To search for the remaining authentic artistic drawings inside the archaeological houses, many of which are destroyed by weather factors, as during these years he documented more than 1,200 types of “cat” lines and colors.

Global artistic icon

He pointed out that all villages and in all governorates contained houses decorated with traditional drawings “the cat”, “scales” or “Al -Ziyyan”, which are all names of art forms that have turned into a global icon since its registration within the representative list of the inherent heritage in “UNESCO” in 2017.
The journey of searching for the “cat” among the heritage villages was not easy for the brilliance, due to the demolition of large parts of the houses that contain the cat inscriptions executed in traditional colors that bring from the surrounding nature, in addition to the danger of snakes and toxic insects in some homes.

In his explanation of the details of the traditional “cat” that adorns one of the archaeological houses, Al -Mamaa indicates that its most prominent component is the so -called “network”; They are lines intertwined in one color, followed by other lines called “Al -Hanash” because they are quoted from the shape of the snake or snake, then the “seal” or “seals” comes as a closure of the end of the artistic form, indicating that the true meaning of the word “cat” is the multiple cross lines that are usually drawn below the original painting called “scribes” or “engraving”, as it is called in some villages Any decorating the house.