Under the leadership of the mayor of Baghdad, fifteen frescoes have flourished on the walls of the capital to pay tribute to architects, poets, painters or intellectuals from Iraq and elsewhere in the world.

Feet dangling in front of a concrete structure, Wijdan al-Majed brings a few ocher touches to the eyelid of the Iraqi poet Muzaffar al-Nawab.

Accompanying his portrait, scenes of life in a village represent peasant women in traditional dress.

His paint cans are stacked in a crate, brushes and paintbrushes of different sizes are soaking in water.

As they pass, cars, motorcycles and tuk-tuks slow down to observe the atypical scene.

“The most handsome of the Muzaffar!” shouts a teasing driver.

"We bring joy to abandoned places," says the 49-year-old artist, who teaches at the Faculty of Fine Arts, amused.

Iraqi artist Wijdan al-Majed puts the finishing touches to one of his frescoes in Baghdad, April 26, 2022 AHMAD AL-RUBAYE AFP

This is the first street-art experience for Wijdan al-Majed, who is more accustomed to exhibiting her watercolors and acrylic paintings in the cozy atmosphere of exhibition halls, often frequented by the same circles.

Today his art is "open to everyone, to all social categories", enthuses the artist, jeans and shoes stained with paint.

"Artists, passers-by, street vendors, young and old".

“Society accepted me”

The shimmering colors break the monotony of a concrete and chaotic capital, where along the avenues the cables of the electric generators form thick interlacings.

A fresco by the late Anglo-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid on a wall in the capital Baghdad, April 26, 2022 AHMAD AL-RUBAYE AFP

On a fresco, mysterious gaze and chin on the palm, the late Anglo-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid poses in front of her achievements.

Nearby is the portrait of Jawad Salim, one of the fathers of modern Iraqi art, and even the German sociologist Max Weber, surrounded by books.

In a largely conservative country, painting in the middle of the street comes with "significant challenges" for a woman, admits Wijdan al-Majed.

Sometimes employees of the municipality accompany him to assist him in the field.

For the first paintings, she was helped by another artist, before continuing the project alone.

"I sometimes stay very late at night, sometimes until midnight, two in the morning," she says.

"The street is worrying, it's not easy for a woman to stay there until these late hours".

There are also, in some cases, derogatory comments.

"I have to deal with it," she concedes.

"I hear them and I don't pay attention to them. They too have started to get used to a woman who paints".

A fresco by German sociologist Max Weber surrounded by books on a wall in Baghdad, April 26, 2022 AHMAD AL-RUBAYE AFP

An Iraqi artist in Dubai wrote to him to tell him that she would have dreamed of working like this in Baghdad, but that she was "afraid of society".

"But Iraqi society has accepted me," adds Majed.

"Beauty in the City"

The initiative launched nine months ago by the mayor of Baghdad Alaa Maan aims to bring out "beauty in the city, bring art to the streets, eliminate the gray color, the color of dust".

The trained architect chooses the personalities that are drawn.

He recognizes that a capital of nine million inhabitants which produces up to 10,000 tonnes of waste per day is also waiting for major infrastructure projects, hampered by the great ills of the country: corruption, risky management of public funds and bureaucracy.

"The city is the first victim: any problem hitting a country is reflected there. When there is unemployment, you will see street vendors (...) when there is a housing crisis, you will see slums."

Murals painted on walls in Baghdad by Iraqi artist Wijdan al-Majed, April 26, 2022 AHMAD AL-RUBAYE AFP

The walls of Baghdad are also covered with graffiti sharing the hopes and political messages of the demonstrators mobilized during the popular uprising in the fall of 2019. They denounced a jumble of decaying infrastructure and endemic corruption.

In the working-class district of Sadria, two watermelon sellers, one sitting cross-legged, overlook a roundabout.

The reproduction of a painting by Hafidh al-Droubi had its small effect.

"It is the heritage of Baghdad and Iraq", is moved Fadel Abou Ali, 63 years old and a fabric seller, hoping to see such initiatives "reproduce in all the provinces".

But he expects more from the authorities.

"Not just the drawings, not just the appearances. We also want cleanliness in the streets of Baghdad, mains drainage, public gardens".

© 2022 AFP