Omar Hamdi (Malva) was born in 1951 to a shepherd’s family in a small village of mud cottages in northern Syria. He spent a lot of time in his early childhood enjoying the wilderness and developing his talent for drawing and painting. Selling ice cream and cakes, working in the cotton fields, and painting posters for the local cinema allowed him to contribute to the support of his family.

At 17 Malva left home for Damascus with thirty-five oil paintings. He painted with intensity, expressing his fear and ambition with bright colors and a strong and heavy brushstroke. In the coming years, Malva’s work was shown widely in Syria, and at exhibitions in Moscow, Sofia, Budapest, Belgrade, and Cairo.

Malva worked as a painter for the Ministry of Education and as an art critic and art director for the magazine “Al Fursan.” After settling briefly in Beirut, in 1978 he and his wife escaped the war-torn city with false passports. That same year, he became an Austrian citizen and received his master’s degree from the University of Stattsburger.

He began to find increasing artistic success in Europe after taking a step into a new field: painting landscapes in an impressionistic style and technique. Memories of the colors and light of Malva’s homeland were incorporated with a new expressionism.

Malva’s love of abstract art is seen in his free use of color. He has the most unique sense of color and the relationship between various tones, hues, and intensities of colors.

To sense the mood of a Malva, one must only study a small part of the painting. It is in this manner that the enthusiasm of each painting can be understood; Malva’s emotions are depicted through his paint brush.

Sadly, Malva passed away on October 17, 2015 after a brief battle with leukemia.