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Abu Zayd: a Baghdad delivery brand, drawn by al-Wasiti (1237)
I live in Baghdad. In 1237, in this city, Yahya al-Wasiti painted the Maqamat of al-Hariri (BnF Arabe 5847): fifty stories about Abu Zayd, a sharp-tongued wanderer who turns up in a new town in each one, and his pages are full of camels, boats and people on the road. Today the people on Baghdad's roads are delivery riders with a box on the back of the bike, and to me they look like his caravans. So I made two Recraft Styles from his pages, one painted and one vector, and gave Abu Zayd a job: a delivery brand with an emblem, icons, a pattern, packaging and an app screen, all in the hand of a Baghdad painter, not a Persian one. Every order is a maqama.
Part 2/3 of one series, "three old ways of seeing Iraq: stone, paint, light". The other parts: Nineveh draws Baghdad (stone) and The colours Iraq lost (light). Instagram: @lostcolours.iq
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