Watch the film ‘Letters to My Father’ which shows behind the scenes footage of the Iraqi artist Salam Atta Sabri and introduces his latest publication with a conversation between Salam Atta Sabri, Tamara Chalabi and Philippe Van Cauteren.

Salam Atta Sabri (b. 1953, Baghdad) is one of the most important Iraqi artists of his generation. He was raised in an artistic environment – his father Atta Sabri was also an artist – and became familiar from a young age with the work of various well-known (Western) artists, such as Van Gogh and Goya, through the art books in the studio.

The drawings entitled ‘Letters to my father’ (2010 – 2019) are published in their entirety in the book of the same name and can be viewed as visual letters with textual insertions to a beloved father. They are an intimate snapshot of a one-way conversation between the artist and his father; both biographical and historical, as though a combination of diary and correspondence.

The book has been sponsored by Rabee Securities. It is available to purchase here.