Vladimir Tamari

Vladimir Faik Tamari was born in Jerusalem, Palestine, in 1942. He went to the Friends Boys School in Ramallah, and studied physics and art at the American University of Beirut, with one year at St Martin’s School of Art, London. After leaving university in 1963 Vladimir Tamari has never stopped drawing and painting – primarily in watercolours – as well as being active in his parallel careers as inventor and physicist. 1963 was also the year he designed a new Arabic typeface, which he named Al-Quds [Jerusalem], and invented a three-dimensional drawing instrument, building the first prototype in Arab Jerusalem in 1964 and later models in Japan.

Stranded in Beirut during the 1967 war, he edited a documentary film on Jerusalem entitled Al-Quds, designed a book of Palestinian refugee children’s drawings, drew posters, cartoons and graphics for the liberation movement, and worked as an illustrator for UNESCO. He moved to Japan in 1970, where he still lives. He has illustrated Japanese children’s books and helped edit a photo book on the Sabra–Shatilla massacre. Since 1980, in addition to his artwork, he has made intensive studies in optics, imaging, and auto-stereoscopic displays. He has published papers on his theory of the cancellation of diffraction effects in waves, a concept in physics for which he holds US patents. He also held UK, Japanese, and US patents for Arabic typography, and for threedimensional and perspective drawing devices.

His writings have appeared in various publications such as Mawaqif, Optoelectronics and Leonardo, the latter a journal for art and science of which he was an international co-editor. His most recent project was a series of 24 watercolours each made while listening to the music of a different composer.

His works are included in many private collections around the world, and in public collections at the Paris Institut du Monde Arabe, the National Arts Museums of Jordan and of Qatar, the Shoman Foundation, Bryn Mawr College, the British Museum, Birzeit University and others.

He lives in Tokyo with his Japanese wife Kyoko and they have two daughters Mariam, an opera singer, and Mona an architect.

No 1, 13 February 1987, water colour and gold foil on paper, 54.8 x 73.8 cms

Front cover: No 28, 10 July 1995 watercolour and gold foil on paper, 54.8 x 73.8 cms

No 14, 10 August 1989, watercolour on paper, 19.1 x 25.5 cms