Retired engineer turns Hit’s walls into canvases celebrating history

ANBAR — Retired engineer Amer Hazim has set out to transform the walls of his hometown of Hit into large-scale artworks, spending long hours under the sun in a cowboy hat painting scenes from Iraq’s history, archaeological landmarks and local figures on school walls and government buildings.

Hazim told 964media that “the painter preceded the camera by a long time,” saying an artist describes a place with a brush rather than words.

He said a mural depicting the historic Hit Castle has taken a month so far and remains unfinished, while he continues work on several other murals at the same time.

“The simplest mural I painted was of three figures from Hit,” he said, noting that he uses different brush sizes depending on the work, from very small brushes for details “as fine as a hair” to small and medium-sized ones.

Hazim said he believes Iraq remains distant from abstract art and that its audience is limited, despite Baghdad’s reputation as a center for visual and abstract art in the Middle East. He said such artistic schools are not accessible to everyone and that he prefers portraiture and impressionist-style works like the murals he is creating.

While working on one mural, Hazim found himself reconsidering a famous symbol of ancient Mesopotamian civilization.

Although commonly known as the winged bull, he said observations made during the painting process led him to think the figure more closely resembles a lion.

“It is a lion in every respect except for the hoof, which makes it closer to a bull,” he said. “The bull does not have a tail like this, nor this composition, features, chest, body lines, thighs and legs. All of them suggest it is a winged lion rather than a bull.”

Hazim said he is pleased to see tourists stopping to take commemorative photographs beside the murals, which aim to showcase the beauty and history of Hit. For that reason, he said, he is drawn to art that carries historical, cultural and civilizational themes.

He also revealed plans for a large public artwork along the city’s waterfront.

“There is a project to create a mural 30 meters long on the Hit Corniche,” he said. “We hope the municipality will prepare the wall, then we will bring a team of artists and each painter will leave a mark, creating a panorama with multiple scenes of Hit’s historical, civilizational and contemporary landmarks, to be called the Panorama of Hit.”

Local resident Hamed Sabbar, an admirer of Hazim’s work, called on the people of Hit to support the murals by contributing paint, art supplies or words of encouragement.