A FORUM on CULTURAL PRACTICES in the REGION Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria

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A FORUM ON CULTURAL PRACTICES IN THE REGION Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria

April 2 - 7, 2002 Beirut, Lebanon

Compiled by Christine Tohme and Mona Abu Rayyan Texts edited by Ghenwa Hayek, Bilal Khbeiz, Samer Abu Hawache

A Project by The Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts, Ashkal Alwan 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 2

Home Works: A Forum on Cultural Practices in the Region Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria

A book by Christine Tohme and Mona Abu Rayyan

April 2 - 7, 2002 Beirut, Lebanon

Curated by: Christine Tohme Produced by: The Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts - Ashkal Alwan Supported by: The Prince Claus Fund, Ford Foundation and the Lebanese Ministry of Culture

This book is published by the Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts - Ashkal Alwan Shashmanian building, 3rd floor, Boutros Dagher street, Gemmayzeh, Beirut, Lebanon [email protected]

Copyright © 2003 The Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts - Ashkal Alwan Copyright © 2003 Christine Tohme Texts copyright © 2003 the authors All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher.

ISBN 9953-0-0117-0 Tohme, Christine/Abu Rayyan, Mona Home Works: A Forum on Cultural Practices in the Region Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria Cultural Studies/Art Practices/Middle Eastern Studies/Graphic Arts/Performance Art

Opposite page: Image from Graham, Kunth, Patashnik, Concrete Mathematics.2nd edition, Preface, viii Following spread: Missing Links, image by and courtesy of Marwan Rechmaoui Introductory Image (Arabic): ‘Quel bon sens’, provided courtesy of Michel Sayegh, L’Orient-Le Jour Photographic documentation and reproduction: Agop Kanledjian Other images were provided by Fondation Arabe pour l’Image, the Al-Mustaqbal Daily Newspaper and the presenters/performers

Design and artwork: Mind the gap Scanning and repro: Mind the gap Typography: Monotype Gill Sans Printing and binding: Dar el Kotob Printing House, Lebanon, January 2003

This book was published with the support of the Prince Claus Fund

Additional support to the Home Works Forum project was provided by the Ford Foundation and the Lebanese Ministry of Culture

Ford Foundation 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 3

Graham, Kunth, Patashnik, Concrete Mathematics.2nd edition, Preface, viii 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 4 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 5

Missing Links, courtesy of Marwan Rechmaoui 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 6

Acknowledgments

The Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts, Ashkal Alwan, would like to express its gratitude to all those who participated in the Home Works Forum, and to all those who contributed to the making of this book. The participants to the forum were: Jananne Al Ani, Mohamad Ali Al- Atassi, Abbas Baydoun, Catherine David, Bita Fayyazi, Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige, Hassan Khan, Samia Mehrez, Issam Nassar, Khalil Rabah, Rasha Salti, Lina Saneh & Rabih Mroué, Randa Shaath, Jalal Toufic, Nadine Touma,Akram Zaatari and Tirdad Zolghadr. Films and videos screened at the forum included: Al Mumiaa - The Days of Counting the Years, by Shadi Abdel Salam; Tahadi, by Nizar Hassan; Zinat: A Special Day, by Ibrahim Mokhtari; Baalbeck, by Ghassan Salhab, Mohammad Soueid and Akram Zaatari; The Arab Dream - Homage by Assassination - Cyber Palestine,by Elia Suleiman; and, The Sleep of Reason:This Blood Spilled in My Veins,by Jalal Toufic. The contributors to the making of the book include as editors, Samer Abu Hawache, Ghenwa Hayek and Bilal Khbeiz; as translators, Samer Abu Hawache, Mona Abu Rayyan,Tony Chakar, Leila Khatib, Bilal Khbeiz, Rasha Salti, Karl Sharro and Afif Talhouk.We would like to thank Walid Sadek for his generous consultations. Finally, our gratitude to Mind the gap. Other persons, whose support was vital to the making of this entire project, were: the Minister of Culture Dr. Ghassan Salameh, Mona Abou Samra, Raseel Hadjinian, Pierre Abi Saab, Rose Issa, Basma El Husseiny, Samar Wahab, Geerta Wachter, Sami Azar, Karl Bassil, Merwad Abdullah, Omar Harkous, the Cultural Consulate of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Mounira Solh, Ghassan Mukheiber, Zico House and the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art.

Due to legal considerations, one lecture presented at the Home Works Forum was not incorporated in this book. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 7

Contents

Introduction...... 11

Lectures Scenes and Types, Jananne Al Ani ...... 14 Culture and Arts; Re:The Actual, Abbas Baydoun ...... 22 Learning from Beirut: Contemporary Aesthetic Practices in Lebanon, Catherine David ...... 32 Latency, Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige ...... 40 Image in Crisis:The Case of Hajj Metwalli’s Family, Samia Mehrez ...... 50 Early Photography in Palestine: Between Social and Imaginary Landscapes, Issam Nassar ...... 58 Framing the Subversive in Post-War Beirut, Rasha Salti ...... 78 ‘Ashura’, or Torturous Memory as a Condition of Possibility of an Unconditional Promise, Jalal Toufic ...... 94 The Singular of Seeing, Akram Zaatari ...... 102 Shahrazad: Political Art Brochure, Tirdad Zolghadr ...... 110 Performances Tabla Dubb:An Audio-Visual Performance, Hassan Khan ...... 120 Biokhraphia, Lina Saneh and Rabih Mroué ...... 122 Ode to Rhinos, Nadine R. L.Touma ...... 136 Exhibits The Crows, Bita Fayyazi ...... 145 Copyright, Khalil Rabah ...... 147 Being there…, Randa Shaath ...... 149 Films Al Mumiaa - The Days of Counting the Years, Shadi Abdel Salam ...... 152 Tahadi, Nizar Hassan ...... 153 Zinat:A Special Day, Ibrahim Mokhtari ...... 154 Baalbeck, Ghassan Salhab, Mohammad Soueid, Akram Zaatari ...... 155 The Arab Dream - Homage by Assassination - Cyber Palestine, Elia Suleiman ...... 156 The Sleep of Reason:This Blood Spilled in My Veins, Jalal Toufic ...... 159 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 8 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 9 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 10 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 11

Beirut, a city just rising from a civil war, and which is threatened by all kinds of perils, is seducing artists and writers from all over the globe. It is not self-evident for Beirut to be able to support this combination of people who produce culture and art. For a long time, we have been accustomed to a sharp division between East and West, modernisation and tradition and national identities and the conditions of being open to the world.This division always puts us in a difficult position when it comes to our relationship with the ‘other’.The ‘other’ was always defined by clear attributes: Nationality, language, gender, colour, religion and declared positions.We always had to examine these positions, and their closeness to our own, in order to be capable of greeting this ‘other’ with the welcome she/he deserves. Her/his ideas did not weigh much in this respect, no matter how novel or serious they were. For long decades, we only translated into Arabic the books produced by the West that we deemed convenient; and, we only welcomed and read those who sympathised with our causes, and identified with our identities. I believe that the last two decades have witnessed some thoughtful and successful attempts to break these rigid moulds, and to place the seriousness of ideas and preoccupations as the criteria for calling upon a certain intellectual, from the far ends of the earth, to come and present her/his work and ideas to us. It is to those few that we owe what we've accomplished today.They are the ones who inspired us to be courageous enough to leave the sharp divisions – that we were accustomed to – behind us, and to attempt the creation of an active and serious debate, based on the close relations between the fields of research or the identification required in determining the questions which need to be asked. The forum that was held last year was a modest attempt to break this rigid pattern. I believe that I should thank all those who shared my dreams and ideas, and all those who helped me face the enormous difficulties that I encountered during the preparations for this event.The experience has allowed me to hope that subsequent forums and projects will be held on this basis, to allow shared ideas and related fields of research to gather people from all over the world, in this small city, as in other cities in this region of the world. Christine Tohme Ashkal Alwan, 2003 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 13

LECTURES

Scenes and Types, Jananne Al Ani Culture and Arts; Re:The Actual, Abbas Baydoun Learning from Beirut: Contemporary Aesthetic Practices in Lebanon, Catherine David Latency, Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige Image in Crisis:The Case of Hajj Metwalli’s Family, Samia Mehrez Early Photography in Palestine: Between Social and Imaginary Landscapes, Issam Nassar Framing the Subversive in Post-War Beirut, Rasha Salti ‘Ashura’, or Torturous Memory as a Condition of Possibility of an Unconditional Promise, Jalal Toufic The Singular of Seeing, Akram Zaatari Shahrazad: Political Art Brochure, Tirdad Zolghadr 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 14

Scenes and Types

Jananne Al Ani

Scenes and Types is a generic beaded curtain.The photographs title often attributed to early pho- hang in elaborate gold frames, with a tographs and postcards, produced picture light positioned above every for consumption by a growing piece. Each image is an amalgam of a European market, to suggest an famous painting, Botticelli’s Venus, anthropological or ethnographic Goya’s Naked Maja, Ingres’ Turkish authority.Through this lecture, I Bath and A Shop Front: A Butcher, A intend to outline a number of con- Baker or A Grocer. cerns in my work as an artist and a The second installation, After curator, by examining some of my Eden, attempts to bring together two own works in relation to the tradi- 19th century European obsessions: tions of Orientalist painting and The fantasy of the harem in Western photography – including 19th and painting and the preoccupation with early 20th century Orientalist post- growing tender, exotic plants.What cards and studio portraits – and to emerges as most interesting in this examine this body of work in analogous presentation is the harem contrast with the photographs projected as a site of fantasy, in taken by Gaetan de Clerambault which delicate exotics are protected and Mark Garanger. and nurtured.This work appropriates I will begin by describing two details from the portraits of the early works, which explore the women in iconic Orientalist paintings construction of beauty and the rep- by Ingres and Delacroix, which are resentation of the female body in then juxtaposed with images of Western art, particularly the image orchids – flowers that have a partic- of Middle Eastern and North African ularly strong association with women in Orientalist painting. Both exoticism and sexuality.As a note, works adopt the strategy of appro- these large transparencies were dis- priation in an attempt to played in a conservatory in a rural re-contextualise the original material. location in northern England. In the first installation, five framed Through the installed images, the photographs hang in a gallery, a viewer looks out onto an idyllic darkened space, entered through a British landscape beyond. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 15

In recent years, I have become European men about the danger of increasingly interested in Orientalist disappointment when finally con- photography. Late 19th and early 20th fronting Arab women in the flesh. It century photographs of Middle also exposes the reality that many Eastern women drew heavily on a Orientalist artists had never, in fact, pre-existing repertoire of themes, worked in the Middle East. Rather, already established by the genre of they simply painted in the studio, Orientalist painting, among these: using an assortment of ‘Oriental’ The harem, the odalisque, the white props and European models. mistress and her black slave – images ranging from the ethno- I warn all men that if they run to Al-Hijaz 1 Graham-Brown, Sarah, Images graphic to the pornographic. In her in search of the charming face which appears of Women, London: Quartet exhaustive book on the representa- in my sketch book as ‘a Badawi girl’, they will Books, 1988,p.40. tion of women in photography in the Middle East, Images of Women, Sarah Graham-Brown examines the relationship between the traditions of Orientalist painting and photography. For Graham-Brown,“the difference between paintings and photographs lies in the way they appear to the viewer. As Barthes suggests, this product of chemistry has a claim to “represent a reality” in a way no artist would claim for a painting.The process of photography, therefore, could transform these imaginative arrangements in the studio into ‘proof’ of the way in which people in the Middle East and elsewhere looked and behaved.”1 Not only do photographic images of Middle Eastern women emerge from a tradition of painting, but they are also heavily informed by Western literature. In some of the extraordinary writings of European travelers who documented their encounters with the Orient and in particular, their experiences of encountering veiled women for the first time, the veil had become, and remains, the most significant sign or symbol of the ‘Oriental’ woman.The following extract from the writings of Sir Richard Burton is interesting in that it is a warning to other

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be bitterly disappointed:The dress was Arab, loss of indigenous male control over but was worn by a fairy of the West.The Hijazi women.Western men’s fantasies of woman’s eyes are fierce, her features harsh what lay hidden out of view from and her face haggard; like all people of the them are a common theme in the South, she soon fades, and in old age her writings of the time: appearance is truly witchlike.2 Sequestered within those inviolate walls Underpinning these images is an are the two great mysteries of the East – its overall imbalance of power women and its wealth. Both are jealously between the coloniser and the guarded from the eye of the stranger; both colonised, the photographer and his are, in the most literal sense of the word, subject and between men and interred, for the manner of the Moor betrays women. Photography is an exercise nothing concerning the extent of the quality in power.Those in front of the of his possessions.4 camera frequently feel threatened by its ability to ‘freeze’ them into an One of the ways in which image; and, photography was used photography worked hand-in-hand as a threatening weapon by many with anthropology and ethnography Europeans to coerce their subjects was by documenting what the pop- to pose for them.The following ulation of a country looked like, so anecdote illustrates this beautifully: that a culture became represented by props, objects and costumes. The photographer Maxime du Camp vis- Often, the titles attributed to studio ited Egypt and Palestine in 1848 and 1849 portraits of native people were very with the novelist Gustave Flaubert. Du Camp generalised; for instance, An Arab described how he used Hajji Ismail, one of the Woman and A Turkish Woman. sailors on the Nile steamer, which the party Frequently, they would be sailed on, to pose for him, usually only wearing erroneously titled and pieces of cos- a loincloth. “In this way,” he remarked,“I was tume would be incorrectly identified. able to include a uniform scale of proportions Women who posed for the photo- on every one of my plates.”To persuade the graphs were often paid models who man to remain still for the required length of acted out different characters, so time, he turned the camera into a threatening that you might find the same object;“I told him that the brass tube of the woman appearing as an aristocratic lens jutting out from the camera was a can- Turkish lady in one studio portrait non, which would vomit a hail of shot if he and as an Egyptian peasant woman 2 Burton, Sir Richard F., Personal had the misfortune to move – a story which in another.This whole idea of per- Narrative of a Pilgrimage to al- immobilised him completely”.3 formance is interesting to me. I also Madina and Meccah, 1907,1st Edition, 1855,Vol.II, p.85. love the painted backdrops in these There were other ways in which photographs, often strange combi- 3 Du Camp, Maxime, Le Nil, Egypte et Nubie, quoted in the camera might be perceived as a nations of Eastern and Western Francis Steegmuler, Flaubert, G. threat. In cultures where the regula- landscapes, palm trees entwined and Madame Bovary, London: tion of women’s visibility was an with ivy, desert landscapes with Robert Hale, 1939,p.196. important part of patriarchal control, Germanic follies in the distance and 4 Devereux, Roy, Aspects of photography might suggest not only oak trees and ferns, juxtaposed with Algeria: Historical, Political, Colonial, London: J.M. Dent & an assertion of the photographer’s women posing with a range of Sons, 1912,pp.6-8. power over the subject, but also a ‘Oriental’ props. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 17

I decided to try and make a because it concealed their identity. piece of work that said something And, some have described the about this idea – that costume or excitement they felt when seeing dress can represent an entire group women reveal other parts of their of people or culture. In much of my bodies, while preferring to keep their work, I use my family as the ‘per- faces hidden in order to preserve formers’. One of the reasons I use their identity: them, particularly in the context of my ideas about anthropological The veil seems to be the most impor- photography, relates to the fact that tant piece of their dress:Their chief care is my mother is Irish and my father always to hide their face.There have been Iraqi. So the family embodies a kind many instances of women who, upon being of cultural mixing, which I wanted surprised naked, eagerly covered their faces, to preserve in this work, an ambigu- without shewing any concern about their ity and sense of unfixed identity that other charms.5 reflects, to some extent, the methods of the Orientalist painters Despite the Christian veil existing who often used European models as a symbol of modesty and piety in dressed up as ‘Oriental’ women. I Europe, this quote suggests that the wanted to use models who repre- primary function of the Muslim veil sented various stages of Arab-ness, is to conceal the identity of the Muslim-ness or European-ness. In wearer. As a consequence, the the first image, the women appear notion of the Muslim veil being a in ‘ordinary’Western dress and in the second image – by placing apparently Oriental costumes on them – the viewer begins to interpret the identity of the women quite differently.The costumes themselves are part reality and part fiction. Some of them are ‘genuine’, while others were bought from tourist shops in the Middle East, so they represent a kind of fictional ‘Oriental’ dress. Photographs of Middle Eastern women produced by European – and later also by indigenous – photographers spanned a whole spectrum of functions, from the anthropological to the pornographic. They illustrate many of the European myths about veiled women and the fantasies of what might lie beneath the veil. Many European travelers 5 Niebuhr, M., Travels Through described how important it was for Arabia, Edinburgh: R. Morrison women to keep their faces covered & Son, 1792, 2 vols. vol. I, p.118.

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symbol of modesty is dismissed and Under the arcades of the Avenue de according to the logic of this obser- France, the veiled women of the common vation, if an ‘Oriental’ woman’s face people go into the shops. Beside these is exposed, she may as well be com- women wrapped up from head to toe, whose pletely naked! eyes cannot always be seen but are always I started to focus much more on seeing, I have the feeling of being naked.7 this particular fascination with the veil, and to investigate the complexi- In his book, The Colonial Harem, ties of what the veil represents, not Malek Alloula examines postcards of just for 19th century Europeans who Algerian women produced during encountered veiled women for the the French occupation and com- first time, but its significance now. pares the gaze of the veiled woman Ironically, many 19th century obser- with that of the photographer’s: vations could very easily be mistaken for contemporary These veiled women are not only an accounts. It has also been interesting embarrassing enigma to the photographer, to examine the difference between but an outright attack on him. It must be European women’s reactions, as believed that the feminine gaze that filters opposed to that of European men. through the veil is a gaze of a particular kind: Often,Western women would feel Concentrated by the tiny orifice for the eye, sympathy for the veiled woman, or the womanly gaze is a little like the photo- would see the veil in the context of graphic lens that takes aim at everything.The Islamic oppression, and be horrified photographer makes no mistake about it: He and disgusted by it. Many men knows this gaze well; it resembles his own expressed an aggressive desire to when it is extended by the dark chamber or tear away the veil to see what was the view-finder.Thrust in the presence of a hidden behind it, while others were veiled woman, the photographer feels pho- seduced and unnerved by it. John tographed; having himself become an Foster Fraser revealed his feeling of object-to-be-seen, he loses initiative: He is dis- insecurity when he wrote: possessed of his own gaze.8

Often I felt there was something uncanny Much of this research has fed about those great eyes of the solemn into a body of work dealing with this women, always bright and always black. Big, relationship between the photogra- unblinking, dreamy, sensuous eyes, which filled pher and the veiled woman, and the one with a nervous curiosity as to what their fantasy of uncovering or exposing owners were thinking about.6 the veiled woman. I produced a pair 6 Fraser, John Foster, The Land of of photographs in which I took a Veiled Women: Some Wanderings in Algeria,Tunisia and Morocco, In contrast, Lucie Paul Margueritte group of five women and set them London: Cassell & Company, points to the relationship between up for a portrait, rather like one 1911,p.75-6. looking and power, which is some- might in a 19th century studio.What 7 Margueritte, Lucie Paul, thing I’ve tried to explore in my own interests me, in particular, about the Tunisiennes, Paris: Les Edition work.What she identifies is the privi- studio portraits is the constructed Denoel, 1937,p.67. leged position which veiled women nature of the image, the painted 8 Alloula, Malek, The Colonial occupy because they are able to see backdrop, the props, the stiff, formal Harem, Manchester: Manchester University Press, and to look, but not be seen or posing and the costumes. Also, early 1987,p. 14. recognised in return: portrait photographers often allow 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 19

us to see the mess of the studio Morocco to recuperate. It was only beyond the edges of the backdrop after his death that an archive of and, in doing so, reveal the artifice of some four hundred photographs, the photograph in the photograph which he had taken of Moroccan itself. In my own work, I wanted to women in the process of veiling maintain this sense of formality, but were discovered. also to reveal the fact that the pho- Clerambault is a mysterious figure tographs are a fiction. and little is known about the circum- One of the ways to achieve this stances under which these images impression was to divide the were made.What differentiates photographs into two – horizontally: them from the Orientalist stereotyp- What is occurring in the top half of ing, so dominant in the photography the photographs, with the veils of his contemporaries, is the delicacy increasing and decreasing, is the for- and sensitivity of the works. Many of mal, posed part of the image; and the women are photographed in what is occurring in the bottom half: genuine interiors, unlike the stage The fact that they are wearing casu- sets of the commercial photographic al Western dress, jeans and shorts studio. Others are photographed etc., is revealing the ‘behind the scenes’ mess.The women stare out at the viewer in quite a confrontational way, and this represents, for me, the idea of the veiled gaze being a powerful gaze. I created a pair of photographs that work together, and are presented facing each other, so each of the women looks back at herself and, as the viewer enters the gallery, they disrupt the space between the two photographs. There are two exceptional bodies of work which, despite being produced under what we might consider to be ‘optimum’ colonial conditions, are somehow able to transcend the circumstances of their production. For me, one of the most significant bodies of work on the veil is that of the French psychiatrist Gaetan de Clerambault. Clerambault was interested in mental automa- tism and passion-based psychoses. He produced two landmark texts on women’s passion for fabrics. Clerambault enlisted as a medical officer during World War I and, after being wounded, was sent to Fez in

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outdoors, appearing active in the ers, they look relaxed and some landscape.What interested even smile back at the camera. Clerambault was the act of veiling Although Garanger’s portraits could itself and, in contrast to the domi- be described as a perfect illustration nant imagery of women becoming of the relationship through photog- increasingly revealed to the extreme raphy between the coloniser and of nakedness, the women the colonised, the ambiguity that Clerambault photographs become arises in a number of the portraits increasingly hidden by the veil, while undermines this thesis. Is it possible maintaining a strange and intimate for the compassion of the individual relationship with the camera. photographer to affect the outcome The veil, as a symbol, is not stat- of an image in circumstances of such ic but constantly shifting according an extreme imbalance of power? to differing historical and political Having been coerced himself into contexts. For example, the removal taking the photographs, is it possible of the veil in public in Egypt in the that Garanger’s sympathy for these early part of the 20th century was a women somehow affected the out- sign of defiance and feminist resist- come? Or perhaps the relationship ance. By contrast, in Algeria in the between the camera and the sub- 1950s and 60s, the veil came to be ject can exist outside these seen by many, including the black parameters.Whilst these photo- intellectual and political activist graphs were being taken, were the Frantz Fanon, as a symbol of Arab women looking back at the colonial- resistance to French colonial ist, the photographer or indeed just oppression.Working as a military the camera? photographer during the Algerian I will finish with a series of recent War of Independence (1954-62), portraits, which I consider to be a Marc Garanger was ordered to continuation of the work I’ve been unveil Algerian women forcibly in doing on the veil.This work focuses order to photograph them so that on the idea of concealment; each of identity cards could be made. the twenty portraits is of a woman Garanger has described the atti- who, in some way, is covering her tude of his superiors towards the face with her hands.This work photographs as an obscene physical addresses the image of the grieving attack. In his view, it was as if the woman which appears throughout women had been raped twice; the the history of art and which is also a first time was being forced to popular motif in reportage and pho- unveil, and the second was having tojournalism.The work is about the their photograph taken. hierarchies of representation implicit Resistance and confrontation are in photography, particularly those visible in the faces of the women relating to the ‘other’, non-European Garanger photographed, and many subject.The images are deliberately of them stare back at him with utter ambiguous; what are these women contempt. However, in some of the doing? Have they just witnessed photographs, the women look sub- some calamity or disaster, or have missive or uncomfortable, they been captured performing some ambivalent even. Surprisingly, in oth- mundane, everyday gesture, sneezing, 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 21

yawning or rubbing their eyes because they are tired, bored even? I’d just like to say, before I end, that this forum is significant for me because this is the first time I have had the opportunity to show my work, and to discuss my concerns and other works I am interested in, outside a Western or European context. Despite coming from the Middle East – I was born and spent my childhood in Iraq – , I have had a British art education and all the work that I create and the methodologies I adopt are framed by the latter context. Much of the work I have shown here, at the forum, focuses on Western constructs of the ‘other’ and is produced primarily for a Western audience. I think it would be really interesting if we could have some discussion about whether this kind of approach to producing work is relevant in the Middle Eastern context, whatever that means; and, if any of the subjects I tackle in my work have any validity outside the context of Western art practice. Is there a clear division in the way artists work across the globe or has so-called globalisation removed any distinguish- ing characteristics? I hope not.

Born in Iraq, Jananne Al Ani currently lives and works in London.Al Ani studied Fine Art at the Byam Shaw School of Art and in 1997, completed an MA in photography at the Royal College of Art. She produces photographic installation, audio-visual, film, video and site specific works.Al Ani has works in a number of public collections, including the Arts Council of England and the Pompidou Centre, Paris. She has exhibited internationally and has had solo shows at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. and the Imperial War Museum in London.

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Culture and Arts; Re:The Actual

Abbas Baydoun Translated from Arabic by Karl Sharro

Once, while visiting an exhibi- Though this comic scene does tion of the work of a well-known not occur frequently, its logic is Lebanese artist, I saw an assort- prevalent.There’s a feeling that ment of paintings some inspired the world is our country, and that by Pissarro and Monet, some we are born and begin as interna- which flirted with Cubism and tionalists. Our painters hold abstraction, and others reminis- dialogues with Picasso, Matisse, cent of the Cobra. When I asked Bonnard and Rauschenberg; our the artist about this, he answered poets hold dialogues with Perse, by saying that, for him, different Lorca, Eliot, Ritsos and Nietzsche; situations and various moments our novelists hold dialogues with push him to Impressionism, while Kundera, Suskind and Rushdie; and others push him towards Cubism our critics are the brothers of and the Cobra. Bakhtin, Genette and Barthes. We The work of the past 150 years are born internationalists, by inter- lies before him; and he has only to national standards and consult his whim to know what to international conditions and with choose and how to approach it. an international outlook.This Of course, not all exhibitions are internationalism of ours is instinc- like this; and, this comic scene does tive, and is perhaps akin to the not occur frequently. Nevertheless, Lebanese ability for adaptation we have heard artists saying that and movement. We are cultural they have painted similarly to nomads, never settling in a single Matisse and Miro, without their place, ceaselessly wandering knowledge, and without the among the oases of modern art knowledge of Matisse and Miro. and culture.This is the instinct of Neither they nor their audience is our internationalism, as much as it naïve, but such an issue is like a is an extreme lightness and tran- secret bank account that cannot sience. We are unique among the be revealed; there is a secret Arabs in not possessing a account between the world and constrictive local self; and we are us, and it had better stay like this. nearly alone among those whose 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 23

local self is playful and uninhibited, producing an identity, as long as marrying and adhering to what- they are negative to the extent ever it encounters, and not finding that they do not produce any- difficulty in accepting the fragrances thing, and as long as identity is a and colours of others. We can talk designation for the future and not here with a certain measure of just an invitation for the past, a respect about a snobbish disposi- work-in-progress more than a tion. I say with a ‘measure of ready-made, a complex idea more respect’ if we understand snob- than a self-repeating movement. bism as the capacity of playing For we often forget that identity, with many faces and adhering to like nationalism, is a contemporary different types and models, a requirement and a modernist capacity for being estranged from attitude. the self or considering it an outfit For the moment, and only for like any other outfit, a face like any purposes of classification, I speak of other face, and in the end, a role two dispositions, one of which like any other role. I neither reject crowds us with images, methodolo- nor rebut this snobbish disposi- gies, styles and suggestions without tion, which I might find healthier necessarily making a place. For this than an obsessive neurosis that crowdedness is a product of the grips the self and the world with touristic intellect and the distinct endless reinstatements, repetitions imagination, and a consequence of and fixations. unstoppable movement and of I do not rebut because I am ceaseless roaming.The second dis- not dealing here with the duality position leans more towards of identity and alienation, although isolation, minimisation, confinement I may appear to be doing so. I am and solitude.What it singles out talking about a psychological, and insists upon becomes, through rather than an ideological, differ- repetition, insistence and corrobo- ence. I speak of the difference ration, an impassioned sentiment… between happy wandering and and becomes elevated to gems, pil- obsession – a difference between lars, glorifying appellations, totems two dispositions, the first for play, and taboos.Two dispositions:The reincarnation and identification; first playful and roaming, fascinated and the second for repetition and by the world, by beauty and by fixation. Wandering is probably appearances; the second inclined not alienation, for alienation is a towards settlement, economy and more serious affair than this rapid dryness.The first is frequently con- movement that does not bear necting and disconnecting, getting inquiry, scrutiny and comprehen- attached to styles, methods and siveness, and pursues instead modes under the influence of a disarrayed images and titles. It is fleeting fascination that rapidly gets satisfied with trademarks and bored and fulfiled and moves to labels, and is not concerned with other places; and the second is structures and particularities, while loyal and persistent. For loyalty and repetition and fixation are involun- persistence also entail heaviness, tary urges that are incapable of boredom and sluggishness.The first

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does not find a medium between from having to think about art. itself, the world and the other; the We do not need to think about second is more firmly established, what others have thought about slower in its movement.The first is and have concluded upon, as we creative because of levity and only need to rely on the result instant improvisation; and the sec- and the application and be satis- ond makes more than it creates, fied with the resulting forms and and makes with capable hands and not the driving questions, with established custom, practice and styles, techniques and methods, skillfulness.The first, colourful, phos- without the theory and the phorescent, embellished, elegant philosophy. And so, this interna- and stylised; the second, more tionalism sets a link made of materially substantial and less forms and techniques between seductive.The first, promiscuous the world and ourselves and and playful – having the air as its allows the import of these forms horizon, the wind as its imagination; and techniques regardless of their the second, earthly, with a fondness culture and their concomitant for mud and details. questions. We have become as For classification purposes only, skilled with these techniques and there appear to be two; but, in styles as if they were our own, reality, there are more than two even though we are unconcerned dispositions. When simplified, they with their questions.Thus, we can appear opposed to each other; say that our arts are mostly tech- but in fact, they are two tempera- nical and that they are based on ments that attract, intersect and skills and practice rather than on compliment each other simultane- experiments and positions. Craft is ously. But if we go back to the in one place and the question in ‘internationalism of Lebanese art’ another.Through this, we can that we call instinctive, we will understand how much stylistics, find that the temperament and formalism, skill and technique disposition of Lebanese art are there are in these arts.This will- closer to the first inclination; for ingness to reproduce the this art is open almost uncondi- international trademark, without tionally to the world and is a its questions and its requirements, direct inheritor of a century and a is present not only in this art, but half of Western art. It contains also in poetry, novels, theatre and fluidity, a congestion of images music. We have often practiced and inspirations, continuous stylis- forms and techniques in disman- tic shifts, excessive stylisation, tling time, alienating narrations, elegance, synthetic prudence and composing in whites and re-pro- a symmetrical spirit. It is also a ducing display, without seeing in colourful, clean art averse to the that more than free forms and literary subject – indeed to every formal suggestions that we prac- subject – to every odd expression tice as stylistic expressions only, and to every distinct idea. unaware of their philosophy, The pretense of international- culture and vision, and unaware of ism in Lebanese art relieves us what they embody in terms of re- 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 25

questioning the conceptions and people, innovation appears to be purpose of art and its connection an art that is synonymous with to the transformations of the fluidity and bedazzlement; and for world and culture. If we acknowl- that, we rely less on negligence, edge that the philosophy of art is disorder and discolouration in our an inseparable part of modern art art. We did not celebrate itself, and that forms with their Surrealism because it dealt with reasons-to-be and their cultural expression and ideas; and expres- and theoretical justifications are in sion and thought disrupt the the end cultural responses – if we balance and fluidity of our paint- acknowledge that – then we ings. We did not take interest in would understand that we pro- assemblage and pop-art; and we duce an art which is cut-off from accepted them unwillingly and its culture, thus transforming the often sought in them a stylicism international trademark into an and an embellishment that do not art without a culture. fit with their initial principles and Silent, technical art is trans- starting points, wasting the idea of formed into a stylistic contest, to finding an art that iconises the an art that is less innovative and ordinary, the ready-made and the less daring than we think.The sty- artificial, and that draws on listic contest employs a measure sources outside art. Our response of visual deception, using bedaz- to pop-art and assemblage seems zlement, elegance, symmetry and to indicate that we did not really seduction as its tools.There is an accept them, and sought to trim elegance, fluidity and kindness in the non-artistic materials of their every work, even those that usefulness and ordinariness, and appear, at the first instance, to be incorporate them into a composi- simply improvising or negligent. tional game that distances them Our art, which leans towards from their origin and thus, trans- excessive colourfulness and syn- forms them into purely artistic thetic balance, may find some elements. Also, Lebanese art justification in the Paris school. accepted installation art unwillingly But, it conceals its own convic- and only in its margins, and is still tions through that scarcity of its experiencing a resident misunder- requirements and its immersion in standing with conceptual art. Let its formalism. Contrary to appear- us say that the innovation that we ances, this art is not disposed hold dear allows us to demon- towards actual innovation; the strate our skills in conditioning, mark of innovation is stronger identification and re-producing than innovation itself. more beautiful, more polite, more The generosity with which fluid and more visually seductive forms and colours are dispensed techniques and forms than when often conceal excessive stylicism, they were originally produced. synthetic caution and formal bal- This may not be the case in lit- ance; it conceals an obvious care erature, theatre and music, but, in treating the eye kindly and a even there, there is a recurring wariness of provoking it.To many characteristic, a calculated con-

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temporariness. We deal less with without a particular question and innovation than with experimenta- at the other, without a particular tion, because we always start from motion. Or, let us say that we are complete models and with studied in the presence of an art that is forms, and because the trimming about motion and another art that and softening of these forms are is gripped by a calcified question, components of our art and litera- as if gripping a smouldering coal. ture.The ‘international training’ For classification purposes only, appears sometimes to bring in I talk about two dispositions and disorder, since the attempt to bal- leanings; and I talk about them no ance the imported elements and matter how little evaluation I the desire to cram in a number of appear to be doing. Classification international accessories throw us in general is general, in general; it – contrary to our intentions – does not apply fully to any single into a kind of imbalance. Perhaps, example and every example this often appears to be the case whose particularities we go into in theatre and film; but, as poetry escapes it.There is, of course, As- appears to be transformed into a Sayyab, who settles and takes hold secondary art, it has almost lost without ponderosity; and there is its adventurousness and now pur- Al-Azzawi, who joins the two dis- sues a form of eloquent positions; and there is Hussein innovation or gets diverted into Madi, from the other dimension, marginal positions. who leans more towards strength Let us return to the story of and deep-rootedness.There is the two dispositions or leanings. Adonis, who is comprehensive We may find Iraqi and Moroccan and seems master of both disposi- art closer to settlement, limitation, tions, as well as many others. I am discipline, minimalism and skilled not concerned with listing or craft, but this does not relieve judging artists, I am just saying that either of them from a burden of what we think of as a conscious immutable elements that hinders decision is, in fact, an internal dis- them and prevents them from position that we cannot frame or being launched properly. It does classify ideologically. It is mostly a not remedy a recurring obsession temperament, or something akin that transforms it into stereotyping to it. We can sometimes find the and inactive stylicism and, some- same temperament with signifi- times, into a purely ideological cant differences in painting, poetry, expression. We find, in plastic arts, novels, theatre and music. Its the ultimate expression of this in seduction in painting, for example, the primeval art itself, that rapidly is less cautious. In spite of the fact becomes a depressive and earthly that it is less durable, Lebanese material, which is stereotyped and painting may be the most beauti- melancholic. We may be in ful – but remains the least between two dispositions: At one established – art in the Arab end, a lightness and at the other, world. In poetry, additional caution an obsession. Between the two, is succeeds more at balancing light- an adventure that is, at one end, ness, swiftness, seduction and 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 27

discipline. In film, the international the sons who pick up the attire of trademark changes into an imagi- fifty-year-old terminologies – as if nation, controls the work, half a century does not make any prevents it from breathing and difference? moving, and transforms it into The poets, painters and drama- inconsistent parts, a strangled tists often do not know where language, a withdrawal and a crip- Western modernism or postmod- pling eloquence. Maybe, theatre ernism has arrived at; but this is suffers from a contest that often not the point, exactly.The point is ends with congestion, excessive- that our modernism has not been ness and synthetic disarray – but affected by the last fifty years, and we should not forget that instinctive imports fragments of an artistic internationalism is a characteristic, and literary modernism. It is with- not a handicap; and that stylicism out a philosophical reserve and is a characteristic, not a handicap; without social and political trans- and that excessiveness and light- formations, without universities ness are characteristics, not and cultural institutions and with- handicaps. We should also not for- out a modern economy. It seems get that internationalism is a style, as if modernism, still suspended in a list of attributes, not a cultural art, did not pose a question, and depth, or civilisation or progress still does not. We, here, still entrust over others; for the hotelier art and poetry with what should knows this brand more than the be entrusted to culture and socie- man of letters, as does the restau- ty, as a whole. We still think that rant owner and the man who sells literature and art alone can escape souvenirs. And so, deep-rooted- what applies to society, economics, ness and fixation are merely politics and architecture. Why not? temperaments; and we cannot Modernism, like most of our pos- describe them as regressive or sessions, is still beautiful and reactionary. desirable in itself, and does not Let us see, for example, what need more than discourse about it the discussion of modernism has to be present and established. If yielded – this discussion that the conception of modernism is established figures are still delving temporal, and if modernism was, in into. ‘Modernism’ and ‘modernisers’ the beginning, a distance in time, are two recurring words, today, we then made it eternal and last- that young people use without ing; and we divorced it from time. knowing that this attire once The strange fact is that we are belonged to the generation of stepping into postmodernism with their parents, whose age did not little change in our discourse, and allow them any other words. without questioning the substance Modernism has not changed in of our artistic and literary mod- fifty years and, if anything has ernism. Were abstraction and the changed at all, modernism is today connection to Brecht and Beckett, an accomplished model. If you find and reading T. S. Eliot and Saint fault with the fathers for retiring John Perse enough to establish a early, then what do you think of modernism? Was not, in all of that,

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the assumption of a renaissance, a difficult to attach to any tangible second birth and a new age with- outside. It became legitimate to out any foundation except the question whether it fed on any strength of discourse and verbal present or any circumstance, if recall? Was that not a kind of spe- there was any substance or any cial myth or special magic? Things reality in it. It revolves around materialise just by being named; itself, is born from itself and feeds and modernism and the future on itself; and perhaps, our preva- become as strong as a name. lent culture of discourse does Modernism was the anthem of only that. the nationalist future for some; for Modernism is a culture in others, it was a definition by nega- which conceptions are trans- tion: No to politics, no to the formed into isolated, self-sustaining outside, no to traditions. It was a galaxies, and only immerses itself search for a self that escaped the in its own myth and keeps repeat- world, reality and the outside. Isn’t ing itself.Thus, we can talk about this closer to a special romanti- argumentative islands and examine cism than to an actual the extent to which argumenta- contemporaneity? Isn’t this com- tion – through its language and pleted with the claims of identity? vocabulary, at least – is a renewed The future gets completed with generation of the intellectual and the past; for the future and the conceptual wreck itself. past, in claims like this, are not Abdullah Al Arawi decided one really different.They are two eter- day that we ought to start from a nal times that do not move; yet, historicist Marxism, the ‘Marxism everything moves for and towards of Alienation’ and the German them.The future is nominal and so ideology. He was, thus, countering is the past; for how could it be Althusser who called for starting otherwise – and with what relics, again from the Marxism of Capital. what traces, real or assumed? That Then, Al-Jabiri said that we should is, we are in the presence of a start from Ibn Roshd. In poetry, timeless ‘modernism’ so, there is we did not start from Al-Nafri really no wonder that it was only, but also from Perse, Eliot, rapidly transformed into a verbal Ritsos and others. We started utopia and a nominal type, unaf- from Al-Wassiti, and shortly there- fected by time; and it remained after, from Ibn Moukla; whereas mired in the same discourse, starting from Matisse, Picasso and repeating the same arguments. Miro did not need any declara- The time of modernism itself was tion: “Starting and re-starting”, as probably an apostasy, a discursive Waddah Sharara says. I do not revelation of its fragility and utopi- accuse beginnings, for they are anism; the more reality was legends that the artist cannot do allowed to appear and become without; but the ideology of present, the more its superficiality beginnings always puts us before and its paradoxiality became the start, waiting for it. We do not visible. It appeared beautiful by find an Arab library, museum, the- itself and for itself; and it became atre or concert hall.This does not 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 29

mean that there is no accumula- opment or a technical adventure. tion or heritage, but that ours is a If modernism was the anthem of a culture of suggestions. nominal future or a theoretical Modernism is a cyclical affair dream of a beginning, postmod- without beginnings; it is fragments ernism is not concerned with and shreds. We can only imagine settling any previous accounts; but, our culture as fragments and it supposes that it can establish pieces.There is no real possibility itself without settling accounts and of connection, continuity and with only technical and partial order in units and climates. interventions in special fields. Everything that culture does is There is no critique of modernism ruined by reality, a reality that is in Arab postmodernism, we come without character, forms, clear across attempts in installation art institutions or fixed structures.This or conceptual art; but, we find reality of “amnesia”, if we use the declared or undeclared justifica- Heideggerean concept of amnesia, tions for them.There is no doubt is what transforms an aerial, para- that there is a critical significance doxical and self-supporting culture in some of these works – some of into a kind of a continuous which is self-referential, of course repression, or into separate points – but we cannot easily find what and labels with no connections, might establish movements or cur- frames or overriding themes. If we rents in a collection of works like had started with a nominal mod- this.That is, we are witnessing ernism, then how do we move artistic exercises in a field in into what’s after it? Is the ‘daily’ which it is not enough for the poetry, the dark cynical installa- work to be an artwork only, but is tions, so-called Oriental jazz, the required to be a critique, a scenic bodily theatre or quoting response and a protest in equal Derrida and Huntington enough measure.These are artistic exer- to establish anything more than cises in which the protest against fragments and impotent begin- art is transformed into pure art, nings? There isn’t much behind us the technique and the craft alone really, so how do we proceed without a concept, without having from it into an empty future and a culture and philosophy. continue, by that, a process that Art without culture, this is we can only imagine as separate what we are sinking into, or what leaps in the air? If we distance we might sink into. Of course, ourselves from the details, we can there are exceptions but, I have imagine that this procession is noticed the prevalence of a tech- silent to a large extent. If Arab nical course and explanation, modernism began as a resonating whereas art is supposed to call, what follows it begins as a exceed technicality.This is proba- crime or as a different, silent step. bly one of the results of a Postmodernism begins without complete cultural dislocation in a theoretical accompaniment, which thought appears to be a without a discourse and without a private space, that is, a technical call. It begins as a practical devel- field also. Politics, too, become a

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technical field; and, the public field becomes a foggy image. It is even possible for reality, itself, to be seen as a private field that has its own specialists and experts. Modern culture sometimes appears to be more fragmented than its precedent. Rather, it appears to have been born out of an immense fragmentation of reality, itself, and a quasi-pragmatic surrender to this fragmentation. The transformation of art, itself, to a technical subject means taking it partially out of culture and causing it to exist without justification other than its own rules. In brief, it means a great schism between art and the outside (for these purposes let us call it ‘the outside’); and, this way of mixing between different fields – like what happens in theatre – becomes only a method and a technical performance.The importation of the ordinary and the popular becomes also merely a formal preference. We definitely find, then, in times, in styles, the artistic and the non-artistic, the artificial and the non-artificial, the personal and the impersonal – merely methods.This is what an art that does not renew its protest and does not connect to a movement of protest ends like; and, it lives in a time when culture becomes a secondary issue, and maybe, an additional credit for the politicians and the bureaucrats, and even the priests and the mullahs. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 31

Abbas Baydoun was born in 1945 in the village of Ch’hour, in the region of Tyre, South Lebanon. For a period, he was preoccupied with left-wing political activities, which prevented him from publishing. He was incarcerated and tortured. He wrote and published successively: Tyre,Time in Big Gulps,Visitors of First Rain, followed by Hunting Proverbs, and preceded by Glass Cemeteries, then Critique of Pain, Rooms,This Cup’s Vacuity, Brothers of Our Remorse,To a Patient that is Hope, Uttered in the Cold and Blood Analysis.Aside from poetry, he also writes literary and art criticism. He edits the cultural supplement of the daily As-Safir in Beirut. His poetry has been translated into English, German, Spanish, Italian, Greek and Catalan. His collection Tyre was published by Actes Sud in French.

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Learning from Beirut: Contemporary Aesthetic Practices in Lebanon Stakes and Conditions for Experimental, Cultural and Aesthetic Practices in Lebanon and Elsewhere

Catherine David Translated from French by Rasha Salti

This paper, part of a larger and every object produced in the work-in-progress, is an occasion name of art.To be more precise, for me to exchange a few my interest lies chiefly in what I thoughts on art and its practices would like to denote as ‘the interi- within a Lebanese context, and ors’ of art production, identified in perhaps others. I certainly do not the vocabulary of sociology as an speak from a position of authority, artistic or an aesthetic practice. nor can I pretend to have come all These ‘interiors’ encompass this way to explain to you what objects and propositions that stem contemporary art in Lebanon is. A – at least, I hope they do – from few prefatory remarks will perhaps an experimental and critical prac- shed light on the interrogations tice, the only sort of art practice and observations that animate this that interests me, especially now. paper. Although the title, I would also like to begin by “Contemporary Aesthetic thanking Christine Tohme for invit- Practices in Lebanon”, promises a ing a non-Lebanese and non-Arab review and discussion of a certain interlocutor – a risky decision, I number of specific contemporary believe, in the present context. aesthetic practices in Lebanon, I And I hope for my contribution to have preferred to postpone such be positive and promote debate. an endeavour. I would note, how- This invitation follows a number of ever, that this paper speaks from visits I have made to Beirut in the the perspective of a specific selec- recent past. I did not come here tion of such practices. As to the as a tourist. All of my visits evolved subtitle, “Stakes and Conditions for within the framework of particular Experimental, Cultural and contexts, beginning with a visit Aesthetic Practices in Lebanon occasioned by the Ayloul Festival. I and Elsewhere”, it is important to had agreed to come then, because state, at the outset, that I am not a some people, in whom I have par- sociologist, and therefore, am not ticular confidence, had assured me interested in the whole of artistic that the Ayloul Festival was indeed practices, along with every image a realm for reflection. Dense with 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 33

deeply thought-out presentations, I directed by Christine Tohme and was reassured to discover how lit- produced by her institution Ashkal tle it resembled the myriad of Alwan, and the work of the Arab other cultural festivals that the Image Foundation, an institution world, and not only Lebanon, that – although young – is endures today. nonetheless quite vital, are the Through this and other visits, I spaces through which I became interested in what has approached these artistic and been referred to as the ‘privileged’ aesthetic practices.These three context of Beirut. Obviously, we spaces are embedded in the con- ought to all agree on the quotation text that this paper wants to marks that should bracket the analyse, and which for the attribute ‘privileged’.The word moment have been institution- refers to the very turbulent political alised and instrumentalised only to and social situation in which certain a slight extent.The works embed- configurations are very precarious ded in this context resemble, in a and open for redefinition, in some slight measure, what is commonly ways desirable, while in others, less understood as contemporary art so. In such contexts, certain forms production. And, as such, they run of cultural intervention acquire an the risk, as in other contexts else- urgency and a specificity distinct where in the world, of being from those embedded in less ‘privi- normalised into the practices of leged’ contexts. the dominant international net- In trying to elaborate my works and circuits.They also run a thoughts on this context, it is second risk, the opposite of the important to note that those first one, and that is to be increas- works that have solicited my inter- ingly marginalised and pushed to est have been produced by a operate furtively in un-named constellation of artists and intellec- margins. Neither of these direc- tuals joined in a common cultural tions is overtly endorsed by those project. I insist on specifying that artists and intellectuals I have they do not constitute a group. worked with. On the one hand, there is no My involvement in this context actual group, and, on the other is through a project entitled hand, none amongst them claims “Contemporary Arab to belong to such a group.The Representations”, of which I am a artists that I have been working protagonist. It is a sort of with share a cultural project, even mid-term and long-term project if one is able to discern that this where the long-term prospect not project is far from being homoge- only depends on my will, but also neous or uniform, and that some on the wills and interests of an of its cracks and fractures might ensemble of people. Its ambition is deepen in the future, maybe even to introduce elsewhere than in the in the near future. Arab world – in the hope that the The above-mentioned Ayloul most profound repercussions will Festival directed by Pascale Feghali nevertheless happen in the Arab and Elias Khoury, the projects world – these contemporary

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aesthetic, cultural, critical and pressures inherent to the contexts experimental practices that reside in which they are first articulated. in the Arab world, despite whether Hence, the methodology of the or not the beaux esprits labour at approach to this project needs to proving quite the contrary. be defined as something more than Despite the fact that these yet another massive importation of practices are excessively marginal, a handful of young stars-in-the- a minority, threatened, almost cen- making into the open field of sored and – in some extreme Western capitals. In this sense, cases – silenced, there are critical operating in the scope of the long- and experimental works of prime term, this project is a layered importance that ought to be ren- approach, a work of infiltration that dered visible and circulated in the can be identified as the opposite of Arab world and elsewhere.The the tremulous techniques of spec- order of urgency is, at times, tricky tacle, all too familiar to some orbits to determine and the stakes are of the art world. not only about introducing works, The title, “Contemporary ideas and projects from the Arab Aesthetic Practices”, which seems world into European and Western to irritate some observers, markets, but also about creating deserves a more thorough exami- situations of confrontation to con- nation.The terminology is solidate and protect the fragility of particularly useful for establishing certain articulations. I belabour to distinctions between what stems search for the right words because from aesthetic critical work and I want to avoid using “emergent what pertains to the realm of situations”.That label, whose usage consumption in the dominant is familiar to Beirut, Sao Paolo and culture. In the past fifteen years – Bombay, is pre-eminently neo-colo- maybe less so in Beirut than in nial and reactionary.The notion of other capitals and other cultural “emergence” carries a patronising locales – , contemporary art has tone, with shades of other dubious become deeply instrumentalised notions, such as spontaneity and transformed into a banner (namely, the unexplained, magical and a space that is subsumed and thus, temporary upsurge of a within the larger realm of cultural phenomena) and is therefore, consumption.The framework of disagreeable, even dangerous.The accelerated globalisation and its stakes involved in a project such consequences on culture and cul- as “Contemporary Arab tures should impel us to be more Representations” are modulated in attentive, more actively vested in a dual direction: On the one hand, keeping watch over the whole to introduce a certain choice of issue of heterogeneities. For, in contemporary, critical and experi- themselves, namely when they are mental projects and propositions presented as an essential differ- from the Arab world and, on the ence, heterogeneities become other hand, to ensure that these easily appropriated within the propositions are spared – through logic of global capital.Yet, when this project in common – the the proper attention is given 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 35

them, heterogeneities appear first- and from the onset, the question ly as symptoms of a temporality, of the relationship between the of the variety of velocities that realm of the political and the need to be protected from realm of the artistic or the aes- homogenisation and flattening thetic must be understood as far and, in some cases, from outright more complex, where some of the destruction by a single, dominant complexities have only begun to velocity or speed, namely, the unravel in the past ten years.To speed of capital. If understood as that effect, I would like to cite a such – that is, if revealed rather passage from the work of a than packaged – heterogeneities philosopher who has greatly con- can become a critical challenge, as tributed to rethinking these I hope they do when presented questions, to their actualisation through the framework of con- and their revitalisation today. His temporary aesthetic practices and name is Jacques Rensière, and he not within contemporary art as a is mostly known as a political massive category. philosopher and a specialist in The context of Beirut can also nineteenth century literature. He be characterised as one where the has also worked extensively on circumstances are not yet those of the relationship between the aes- a practiced aesthetic practice, pro- thetic and the political in literature. duced in a highly nationalised Today, his wide knowledge of cine- context in which the market holds ma and his more recent, very a dominant position. And, although consequential and honest interest it is important to understand the in the work of some contempo- situation as such, one should not rary artists, allows him to play a dwell upon its deficiencies and major role in redefining these very merely lament – as some do.The crucial questions. What follows is a situation, as it is, presents a valu- citation, a short text excerpted able context for contemplation. from his notes, announcing a semi- Going back to my stated interest, I nar held in Barcelona: find that those practices that I identify as current, experimental Aesthetic and Political: Rethinking a and critical in Lebanon and else- bond.The relation between the artistic where are necessary because the and the political [or art and politics] has historical relations and the natural often been approached like a rapport bonds between the realm of poli- between two separate and clearly defined tics and the realm of aesthetics are terms.The political was posited as the now again being redefined. I am sphere of matters pertaining to power neither speaking in banal journalis- and the struggle for power.The artistic tic terms, which in my opinion is was posited as the generic name for a dangerous, nor in the terms of the myriad of practices defined by their mate- idiotic grassroots opposition of the rials, their know-how [or craft] and their aesthetic and the political, wherein specific final products.The question then the political role of the artistic is would become whether the artistic could understood, purely and simply, as serve the political without renouncing militant art, or art engagé. Rather, itself, or the reverse, whether its conceit at

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remaining autonomous [or at safeguarding with effects that transgress the its autonomy] does not mask its engage- pure effect. Often, I purposefully ment [or participation] in the game of use the formulation ‘contemporary power.The positioning of these problems aesthetic practices’, particularly in in terms of defined identities reveals as far as it is still very difficult for today, more than ever, its limitations.These some observers and some audi- identities have become themselves prob- ences to conceive that a lematic, not only with regard to the artistic contemporary aesthetic practice is or the aesthetic but also [with regard] to a contemporary project that can the political.The development of a consen- articulate the discursive and the sus, in stride with globalisation, visual, at times, in a complex man- demonstrates this. It is not enough that ner. Some such practices are there should be power, and a conflict over almost exclusively engaged in the power, for there to be the political. discursive with extremely The political is polemical in its configuration restrained visuals, or none at all. of the world as specificity, the objects that This poses problems both in terms make up its parts and the subjects inca- of exhibition, display and circulation pacitated to designate them and argue and in institutional and non-institu- them.The political is about the sharing of tional presentation.The question of the physical, tangible and sensible, the shar- what becomes of an exhibition ing of spaces, time and activities that when its subject is strictly textual define the common whole.The forms of art and/or purely discursive, when are themselves the forms of sharing the ‘there is nothing there to see’, is physical, tangible and sensible.They engage one question that some theorists the political, reconfiguring the common and artists, as well as organisers world, modifying its forms of visibility and of and producers of exhibitions and its objects [parts], the distribution of its contemporary projects, have asked activities and the sharing of its spaces and themselves. It remains an open times.There is, in this sense, an aesthetic question, one that is rarely engaged dimension imminent to the political. Its sup- with seriously. pression is called consensus. At this point, I would like to start from Rensière’s citation It is absolutely fundamental because it works at re-adjusting today to reverse this question. An the pendulum to the hour and the aesthetic work that is precise and day, helps steer clear from false demanding should summon a re- debates on the artistic and the opening and a re-definition of the political and introduces, once political realm, which is driven to again, the question with subtlety extinction or sterilisation by certain and subversion. Rethinking the practices within the dominant dis- political engagements of aesthetic course. Contrary to some practices in Beirut cannot acquire commonly and currently held relief, nor can it rouse those notions, now is the time to interro- already interested in the political gate contemporary aesthetic work dimension of aesthetic practices. and challenge it so as to move Yet, the ‘privileged’ context of beyond its formalisms. Form is Beirut runs the risk of losing its invariably laden with engagements, privilege if either of the two 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 37

threats I mentioned earlier materi- least recognisable as such, is fully alise: Namely, an accelerated operational as an institution. It has normalisation of artistic practices imagined, in the purview of the into dominant genres or an mid- and long-term, a plan and a accrued marginalisation.The stakes series of actions so that its corpus for aesthetic practices lie in their of images would be the most capacity to sustain higher expecta- complex as possible, the most rich tions in their propositions, and polemical. All the while, the specificity in their research work, Foundation has rendered this cor- formal and textual elaborations, as pus accessible to the public, to a well as in their capacity to defend diversity of readings, to projects all of these, at all costs.This situa- framed within a course of histori- tion is not entirely unique and cisation and of articulating serious specific to Beirut.The spaces I relationships between documents attempt to identify for demanding and the corpus of images. It is, of and uncompromising, contempo- course, totally legitimate to under- rary, critical and experimental stand images today as the ‘stuff’ of practices can be found in other dreams. Images belong to every- circuits in the larger social realm, one and to no one at once. as well as in other spaces of However, it is absolutely necessary, inscription and encounters with in my opinion, to produce, in par- other audiences. On this note, for allel, a historical discourse on the instance, it seems to me that the production of images and their cir- limitations of Ayloul was in that it culation and, eventually, on their addressed itself to a public that is confiscation in Beirut.This is an already privileged, one that is issue not only pertinent to the almost identifiable on a map of the Foundation, but also to all those city. By addressing an audience that who are interested in the image is very neatly targeted and not and the document in Beirut and heterogeneous enough, the effect elsewhere. I insist on this point of the festival could not be expe- because, although there are speci- diently diffused in the short or ficities to the cultural practices of median run. It is certainly the Beirut, it is also important not to responsibility of the actors of the remain smitten or lulled by these cultural scene, intellectuals and specificities to the point of becom- artists, to find solutions to such ing incapable of distanced and problems and implement them. historically informed readings.This The case of Beirut is particularly situation of ‘privilege’ in Beirut is, in interesting for two reasons: Firstly, some respects, exemplary if one because contemporary practices does not misconstrue the attribute have not been fully instrumen- ‘exemplary’ within a sectarian or talised and secondly, because the simplistic understanding. In a sense, margin opened for maneuverability what has been occurring here, for is wide enough, albeit extremely the past ten years, is an antidote fragile, due to the absence of insti- against despair, a hope in the polit- tutions. In some regards, the Arab ical and cultural potential of the Image Foundation, the institution aesthetic act.

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I am quite aware that when beyond that. An attentive analysis seen from within this context, the of the contemporary aesthetic issues I am raising may not carry practices in Beirut could con- the same purport. But, when one tribute meaningfully to the is from elsewhere, there is, at deconstruction of the discourse times, a return effect that makes that belabours, with persistence, at linkages, among many contexts, in telling us that modernity was uni- ways that are strong and engaging. tary, homogeneous, and that it Sometimes, these other places can moved along one single temporali- be very close, as akin as an ty marked by innovative inventions accomplice. Some of these con- and subsequent copies. But, the temporary aesthetic practices reality of things is all together dif- here, that have roused my interest, ferent. If one makes the effort to echo with aesthetic propositions open the folds and analyse them, formulated in places very different in Beirut, as in other locales that from Beirut. Some of the works fall outside the canonical realms or that I was able to see in Sao geography of modernity, one finds Paolo, or closer to me, in Paris, works and practices that demand works that are proposed by artists a rethinking of formal invention, a who have nothing to do with rethinking of temporalities, which – Beirut, could well be presented although they cannot simply be alongside the works of Lebanese superimposed – are nevertheless artists, without lengthy explana- the temporalities of the modern in tions or theoretical contortions Beirut and elsewhere. into national and regional identifi- cations.This may be understood as This text is an edited, transcribed translation an important point of validation of the lecture given in French by Catherine for Beirut, but its significance goes David at the Home Works Forum.

Catherine David studied literature, linguistics and art history at the Sorbonne and worked, from 1979 until 1992, as a curator in France. In 1992, she conducted the Primitive History of Cubism seminar for the Department of Aesthetic Anthropology at the University of Paris X Nanterre. She was the director of Documenta X, Kassel from 1994-1997, and organised, in collaboration with the Marseille Museum, Jerusalem au Pluriel, Cultural and Artistic Encounters, in 1998. In 1999 and 2000 respectively, her other projects include Antropofagia, a film and video program, XXIV Biennial of Sao Paulo; City Editings/Reflexiones Sobres el Espacio Urbano Contemporaneo, Fundacion PROA, Buenos Aires; and The State of Things, Kunst-Werke, Berlin; and, as Chargée de Mission at the Direction des Arts Plastiques, Paris. In 2002, she curated Contemporary Arab Representations, Beirut/Lebanon, at the Fundació Antoni Tàpies and Witte de With, center for contemporary art. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 39

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Latency

Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige Translated from French by Tony Chakar

Latency is the state of what This latency of memory coin- exists in a non-apparent manner, cides with an ambiguous relation but which can manifest itself at to images, as they have been any given moment. It is the time presented since the end of the elapsed between the stimuli and war.These images oscillate the corresponding response. between two temporal registers: The latent image is the invisible, The mythified and nostalgic past yet-to-be-developed image on an of Beirut – the pre-war period impressed surface.The idea is that with its images and its sublimated of the ‘dormant’ – slumber, slum- postcards; and the future – as it is bering – like something asleep, constituted in a supposedly collec- which might awake at any moment. tive fantasy that puts us back onto Latency has connotations with the track of the ‘right road of essence, but also with the idea of progress and modernity’, with its the repressed, the hidden, the un- iconography projected in enor- testable, of an invisible element. It mous billboards praising is an obscure form, troubling numerous real estate projects. because it cannot be delineated; The image seems to navigate it is not a defined territory, but a between a ‘this has been’ and ‘this diffused state, uncontrollable, will be’.The present manifests underground, as if lurking, as if all itself, at times, in a hysterical fash- could resurface anew. ion, in a denial of the historicised Latency is the introduction to the inscription. Most often, when one possible, to the state of becoming. approaches the subject of the Latency also evokes what is war, a certain ‘cathartic’ presuppo- often felt in Beirut, in face of the sition – so as not to say a dominant amnesia prevailing since therapeutic program – accompa- 1 A law issued on August 26, 1 1991 (Law Nº 84) stipulates a the end of the war , in face of this nies it to overcome ‘this crisis’. general amnesty for all crimes strange paralysis that pervades the The war is not simply a symptom, committed during the war, up city, in face of this violent desire to but it is also an ontology and until March 28, 1991. Crimes committed after this date place things between parentheses process that cannot be reduced, a would then be prosecuted. – to censure oneself. process that escapes, that 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 41

represses itself and that denotes critical and theoretical structure, latency one more time.The war’s we often find ourselves in the near past becomes this latent fig- process of theorising our work, ure shrouded in the shadow of saying it, writing it. It is also diffi- the city, ready to gush out from cult to reduce our work to a the shade; this memory so quickly precise perspective – such as strangled, the ruins lying under latency – however, it seemed the modernist’s concrete, under interesting to attempt to do so the capitalist’s dream of an effi- within this framework. cient and proficient country. In our approach to photogra- Abdallah Farah: Wonder Beirut, phy, we first began to inscribe the including various works: The Novel traces and memories of war in of a Pyromaniac Photographer and our work, insisting on the ruin, Latent Image. but also on the inscription of Abdallah Farah is a photogra- these modern ruins in the city, on pher whose approach illustrates the modes of perceiving the city the difficulty of creating images and its evolution, on the urban during and after the war.Three tissues and their mutations. We periods can be distinguished were also re-oriented towards a through-out the course of his re-reading of our contemporary work. In 1964, Abdallah Farah was history and its representations, only sixteen years of age when he which shape us. joined the photography studio of This exploration led us to work his father, a former assistant of on borrowed images. Dalati and Nuhra. Studio Wahed This critical attempt often led was located in Bab Idriss in us to impasses, to paralysis, to downtown Beirut. In 1968, Studio crises of representation. But the Wahed received an order from act of making images became the Lebanese Tourism Agency for obstinate, pushing us to seek differ- a series of twenty-four postcards ent ways of ‘saying’ in an alternative on Beirut, as well as twelve illus- way through photography. trations to be used in the official Latency is well illustrated in the calendar of 1969.The orders con- works that we will discuss in this tinue in the following years. paper: Wonder Beirut which refers The photographs, shot over a to the work of a photographer, period of six months for the Abdallah Farah, a ‘documentary’ postcards, attempt to reveal the that we filmed on the Khiam deten- most beautiful tourist sites in tion centre and our research on an Beirut:The city centre, the bank undeveloped 8mm film, which used district, the cinemas, the souks, to belong to Khalil’s uncle, who the hotels, the beaches, the mod- disappeared during the war. ern infrastructure, the urban It is always an almost embar- monuments, the city’s most rassing bother to speak of one’s important avenues and so on. own work. However, this is a Some aerial views were also recurrent approach for many of us taken with the assistance of the in Lebanon. In the absence of a Ministry of Tourism and the army.

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The idea behind the project, which was wholeheartedly supported by the prominent hotels, was to expose the city’s modernity, its diversity and its richness.The quality of this work was such that it was regularly reprinted (and imitated). We still find reproduc- tions of these postcards on sale today in Beirut’s bookshops, even if some of the monuments they depict have disappeared. Abdallah Farah was certainly not the only one who produced postcards, but his work still remains among the most distinguished. After the civil war broke out in the spring of 1975, besieged and invaded by militiamen from different factions, Studio Wahed was destroyed and subsequently burnt to the ground. Abdallah succeeded in rescuing some material – a fraction of his negatives, including those of the postcards and hun- dreds of rolls of virgin films, unshot and unexposed. For an unexplained reason, Farah kept quiet about embarking on a new venture. Three years after the start of the war, and a few months after his father’s death, he began to damage his postcard negatives, burning them little by little – an intentional process of deterioration – as if seeking a way to have their states conform to his present. He imitated the destruction of buildings, which were progressively disappearing before his eyes, ravished by bom- bardment and street battles. In doing so, he inflicted yet another form of destruction. He spent his nights slowly burning his calendar and postcard clichés, making them correspond to his shattered reality. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 43

Through a process, which inte- Abdallah Farah. He talks of “a grates within it part hazard part subterranean body of work, end- accident, these ‘damaged’ images lessly heroic, unequaled and, appear like new photographs. certainly, perpetually unaccom- Through the traces of fire and light, plished, a sublime attempt to an indexical rapport is recreated. capture each passing minute, By the time Abdallah finished fleeting time, running time”.2 burning all these images, the official We imagine recovering peace ending the war was pro- Abdallah’s photographic archives claimed in Lebanon. and deciphering his many note- During the war, often confined books, for the purpose of our 2 Hadjithomas, Joana; Joreige, Khalil, Ok, I’ll Show You My Work, to the house or to the bomb making a catalogue raisonné of his Beirut: Al Adaab, Publication – shelter, Abdallah Farah seldom invisible work. January/February, 2001. went out (as he himself says, he has nothing of the adventurer or the war reporter). During these long years, he mostly photographed the people closest to him, his neighbours and neigh- bouring places. He used the un-shot rolls of film salvaged from his studio; but, short on products, fixatives and, most of all, paper, he was not able to develop his images.The photographed films began to pile up, waiting for a better day, for a moment when the shelling would stop and Abdallah would be able to go out. Since, – and despite the end of the war – he maintains this habit. He doesn’t develop his images anymore. It suffices just to shoot them.The reels accumulate, without him feeling a need to reveal them. He nonetheless precisely documents each photograph he takes in a small notebook, describing it thor- oughly.They are there to be read, leaving an immense space for the imagination. He entitles this work the ‘invisible image’ or the ‘image in the text’. For us, a little obsessed, we see it as a latent image. One of our friends, Pierre Ménard, admires the work of

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Film RE 145

1. 6/3/2000 at 11:20. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude just after a dispute 2. 7/3/2000 at 11:01. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling of euphoria 3. 7/3/2000 at 13:52. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling of hunger 4. 7/3/2000 at 14:30. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling “I’ve had too much to eat” 5. 7/3/2000 at 16:24. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude. Attempt at detachment but, rather, interiorized calm 6. 7/3/2000 at 17:06. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude. Attempt at detachment but, rather, interiorized feeling of boredom 7. 7/3/2000 at 18:08. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude. Attempt at detachment but, rather, interiorized feeling of expectancy 8. 7/3/2000 at 19:07. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude. Attempt at detachment but interiorized exasperation 9. 8/3/2000 at 12:42. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling of excitement 10. 8/3/2000 at 13:08. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling of expectancy 11. 8/3/2000 at 13:52. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling of irrita- tion 12. Ibid. (feeling of having been expressive, hence re-irritated) 13. 8/3/2000 at 15:25. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized undefinable feeling 14. 8/3/2000 at 16:44. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling of “I’m too hot” 15. 9/3/2000 at 03:20. Autoportrait in the mirror, impassive attitude but interiorized feeling of fatigue 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 45

On the left, we see images of it could signify that certain condi- two of the many drawers he uses tions – perhaps linked to the state to store his films.The first contains that the country is in, or to the films shot from Sunday, November state of the art scene – have been 2nd, 1997, to Saturday, February 21st, made present for the ‘revelation’ of 1998; the second from Wednesday, the image to occur. Of course, this November 4th, 1998, to Sunday would presuppose a transforma- April 11th, 1999. Also depicted are tion in our anticipation, in our the textual descriptions of films rapport with images, in general, that Abdallah Farah continues to (The images would gain an ‘aura’, a

call ‘contact sheets’.We have taken different strength:They would be nd 3 Toufic, Jalal, Distracted,2 Ed., the liberty of translating the efficient, “terrible”, in the sense forthcoming from Tuumba descriptions and simply typing used by Barthes). Press, 2003. them out on a computer (Abdallah’s handwriting is very hard to read). Please note that, of Film PE 103 course, this is not a facsimile (an 1. Zakiyeh, drunk, shouting and threatening the sky image of the image), as resorting 2. Close-up, low shot on Zakiyeh, seemingly possessed to the image of these latent images 3. Mr. Srour, furious, on the stairs in front of his door would be problematic. 4. Zakiyeh dragging herself up the stairs 5. Mr. Srour in low shot looks at me inquiringly A fundamental question remains 6. Zakiyeh crawls to the landing that I will evoke only here:That of 7. Zakiyeh asleep, collapsed on the doormat the conditions of apparition, or 8. The same (closer) 9. Close-up on Zakiyeh’s open mouth rather, the revelation of these 10. Half-closed eye-lid images. At what moment, and to 11. The chain around Zakiyeh’s neck and her pendant lying on the ground what purpose, would Abdallah 12. The bottle of arak, on the last stair before the landing 13. Medium-low shot, Elham opens Zakiyeh’s bedroom door Farah choose to develop his films – 14. Medium shot, Elham tries to lift Zakiyeh (risk of moving, missed) to subject his images to light? What 15. The same would have had to change around 16. Medium close-up on the faces of Zakiyeh and Elham, cheek to cheek 17. Mr. Srour in low shot, with his hands on his hips him, in him, beyond him? 18. Elham picks up the bottle of arak on the stairs In his book, Distracted, Jalal 19. Elham puts down the bottle inside the room Toufic writes that the fact that 20. Elham closes Zakiyeh’s door while looking towards my direction 21. The sky seen through the window of my room Abdallah Farah describes his pho- 22. A cloud shaped like an elephant tographs, in a notebook, “can be 23. Jnah. Painted film poster. Julia Roberts, completely deformed, is unrecognizable considered a contribution to the 24. Close-up on the face of Julia Roberts 25. New electric yellow pole, unused, stuck to an old wooden pole covered with resurrection of what has been electric wires withdrawn by the surpassing disas- 26. Front façade of a destroyed building being restored ter.The intended effect of the 27. A workman on a crane opposite the building 28. The workman, a tiny speck, atop the huge suspended crane work of the one trying to resur- 29. Mileage gauge of the car at 99,999 kilometres rect tradition past a surpassing 30. Mileage gauge of the car between 99,999 and 100,000 kilometres disaster is fundamentally not on 31. Mileage gauge of the car at 100,000 kilometres 32. Parked car, with mileage gauge at 100,000 kilometres the audience, except indirectly; it is 33. Medium long-shot of the car parked on Mar Elias street on the work of art to resurrect 34. Close-up on the horoscope in the paper “ You have found the key to happiness it”.3 If we were to witness this among some old things, but you don’t know what door the key opens” 35. Photo of one of my old photos (the postcard of burnt Place des Canons, published change in Abdallah Farah’s work, as without my authorisation in the newspaper) well as in other artists whose work 36. List of the managers of the newspaper for eventual proceedings may evolve in a similar perspective,

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Khiam: (Documentary, The work is a form of experi- 52 minutes,April 2000) mentation with the narrative, with Until the liberation of South the way that the image, through Lebanon in May of 2000, it was the discourse, can slowly construct impossible to go to the Khiam itself on the principle of evocation. detention camp, run by the South It is evocation that is supposed to Lebanon Army (SLA), a proxy militia compensate for absence. for Israel.We always heard ‘talk’ The missing image would then about this camp, without having be filled with the image created seen any images of it. All our infor- through the detainees’ act of mation basically came from the speech.This act of speech testimonies of liberated detainees becomes a screen on which each and the few Red Cross members spectator projects his own images. authorised to enter Khiam. Here The frame expands its limits, until it was what seemed to be an impossi- provokes a breach through which bility of representation. the missing image becomes an Through the testimonies of six open image, and the absence of detainees, three men and three the image a possible image. women that we interviewed, we The frame itself becomes a were confronted with a raw, yet screen, a mask, a relay. partial, document – acts of ‘speak- Today, after the liberation of ing’, which lacked an image. In the South Lebanon and the dismantling documentary, the only images that of the camp, one can go to Khiam. are presented are those of the six The image, at least the image of detainees who take turns speaking. the physical presence of the camp, The images of the camp are is in proximity. latent. The latent image of the camp The setting used in the film is stumbles over reality and its con- strict, the camera fixed, the gaze of frontation. It has become a reference, the detainees calls out to the camera. even if the testimony of the Through the editing, we wait for detainees is not concentrated on the something to occur.The experience reconstruction of the camp’s space as lived by the detainees, their act of much as it is on the experience lived speaking, attempts a reconstruction, in that space – an experience always as meticulous and as detailed as pos- difficult to represent, the experience sible, of the camp – and of the daily of the camp being irreducible, an life in such a place: How the camp ‘impossible experience’. and the rooms were precisely struc- When visiting Khiam, everything tured, how they used to live in a becomes significant. A new fictional 1.8 x 0.8 metre space, what they ate, process enters the relay.The camp’s what they did, how, with only a hand- walls become yet another screen ful of material, they used to fabricate where the repressed ‘real’ refuses to craft-like objects, clandestine and utili- reduce itself, where it overflows itself. tarian, such as needles, pencils, etc. By A frame, a mask, a relay. being extremely meticulous, and by The confrontation between latency giving the utmost attention to detail, and the revealed image functions one attempts to make things exist. ambiguously. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 47

In A State of Latency4, I describe kidnapped7.The onus is on the the Ouzai road in the southern sub- families to demand that the law urb of Beirut, where forty-two posts becomes effective: A missing per- punctuate the road’s axis. Forty-two son can be declared deceased four electrical posts and streetlights, years after the date of his or her invested with frames of identical disappearance.The families who dimensions, recto-verso. Some of have been put in this situation are these frames contain images, por- confronted with a difficult choice: traits representing fighters who To declare someone dead without belong to one of the two principal a trace, without the physical pres- Shiite political and religious move- ence of a body, a corpse. ments in Lebanon, Amal and A few months ago, I stumbled Hizbullah. Under each portrait, a across the archives, photographs and sign with the words,‘the martyr films that once belonged to my fighter’ or ‘the martyr hero’, pre- uncle. He had a passion for pictures; cedes the name of the man. Other he photographed and filmed regularly. frames are still empty, waiting for the I found 8mm films, family footage. portraits of new martyrs.“It is Among these, I found one ‘latent’ strange to realise that the same post film still waiting to be sent to the lab carries the tribute to the martyr and for developing. My uncle probably also the negation of the martyr by a didn’t have the time to send it. It criticism of the very status of the remained in its yellow bag for over image, an empty frame”.5 fifteen years, surviving the ravages of the war and a fire that struck the Research based on the archives and house.The film could contain the 8mm films, retrieved from among last pictures my uncle took, and the belongings of Khalil’s uncle even some photograms represent- Latency is also risk of loss. ing himself. I pondered for a long From this perspective, it constitutes time whether or not to send the the hope of something that will film to be developed; whether to be revealed; the confrontation take the risk that this ‘latent’ image with a real that can be potentially may reveal nothing, causing a disap- 4 Hadjithomas, Joana; Joreige, disappointing. pointment, which would be Khalil, A State of Latency, th 1985 Germany: Iconoclash: ZKM/ On the 19 of August, ,my impossible to compensate. Centre for Art and Media, uncle, Alfred Kettaneh Jr., was driving Finding the right lab, the best Cambridge, MA: Karlsruhe, and a Red Cross ambulance when he chemistry and taking great precau- MIT Press, 2002. 6 was kidnapped. tions didn’t help.The film came out 5 Ibid.

My uncle was never found, and veiled, irreparable. A long series of 6 The practice of kidnapping was never returned. He is still reported white images unfold, and sometimes common in Lebanon during as missing; and, the circumstances of a shadow emerges; we recognise a the civil war.These kidnappings were carried out mostly on the his disappearance remain a mystery. hand, a rooftop, a vague image of a basis of the holder’s identity There is very little evidence to group of three joined by a fourth… card, on which the holders’ reli- explain what really happened. The film thus reveals small variations gious sect was printed.The 17,000 kidnapped were then usually people disappeared this of colour, of movements.We worked used for the purpose of way during the war, and have yet to on this project about my uncle, even exchange. 23 be found. A law issued on June , if developing the film didn’t succeed 7 Text of the law of June 22, 1995 1995, defines the status of the in ‘bringing him back’. Latency (see Appendix)

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presupposes, in itself, the acceptance and to produce our images outside of being revealed and the risk of loss. of a flux, to constantly interrogate These latencies we have present- their necessity, existence and implied, as well as others, point out cations in the world that we live in, possible gestures, traces, some remi- in the video or photographic prac- niscences, which become ghostly and tice we use. Latency appears also as haunt the photographs, the films, the the possibility to exist outside hege- documents, whether true or false. monic and monopolising networks This is a story about return, of (taking the form of censures and the undead, the revenant, of some- exclusions), which sanction alterna- thing resembling the capacity of tives, going so far as to annihilate remembrance that makes us human. them.This is also one of the condi- By remaining haunted, we do not tions for the ‘other’ not to consider succumb to cynicism in the accept- that it is possible to exhaust us with ance of images and of realities in a hazardous appreciation, a diagnosis continuous present. of us, of our manifestations (espe- Being haunted is refusing the cially in artistic work). mechanical state, the machine; it is All our work is rooted on the time that refuses to efface itself. It is frontier of a real; where the ques- something that resists. Being here, tions of the self, of the social body today, is accepting to live with our and of the individual body in a com- ghosts, to long for them, to feed munitarian society pose themselves; them. It is reminiscent of an image, of where it is difficult to pose oneself as a knowledge that inhabits us, a an individual, to say “I”, to say “I am knowledge difficult to pin down.This here, even more than an individual, I seizure, this gesture, we find impor- am a singular subject”. tant – whether in its failure or in its Latency is this ‘being-there’, quest to incarnate as images. although you don’t see me; it is the This gesture forces us to think necessity beyond the evidence.

Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige, both born in 1969 in Beirut, are two filmmakers and artists. In 1999, they directed their first feature film, Al Bayt el Zahr (Around the Pink House), a French-Canadian and Lebanese co-production. In 2000, they directed Khiam, a 52-minute documentary film; and in 2003, The Lost Film.They are the authors of various video and photo installation exhibitions.Among these are: Beirut: Urban Fictions, Poste Restante, The Circle of Confusion, Don’t Walk and Rondes. Lately, they have been working on different facets of their project Wonder Beirut, which include: The Novel of a Pyromaniac Photographer, Postcards of War and Latent Images.They both worked on various articles and publications, including the book, Beirut: Urban Fictions. Joana teaches scriptwriting, and Khalil teaches the aesthetics and philosophy of the image at the Institute for Scenic and Audiovisual Studies (IESAV), St. Joseph University in Beirut, Lebanon. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 49

Appendix PROVISIONS RELATING TO MISSING PERSONS Article 33 The missing person is the person whose whereabouts are unknown and of whom no one knows whether he is dead or alive.

Article 34 (as amended by law N° 434 of May 15, 1995) The decease of the missing person shall be declared by judgment of his disappearance and the lack of news from him for the last four years, at least, since the date of his absence, at the request of any involved party. The Civil Court of the First Instance of the place of residence, or the last residence, of the person for whom a judicial declaration of death is requested, shall hear the case. If the disappearance occurred outside Lebanon, the Civil Court of First Instance of Beirut shall hear the case.

Article 35 (as amended by law N° 434 of May 15, 1995) The Court, mentioned in the preceding article, shall examine in court chambers the request for a judicial declaration of death and, to ascertain the facts, the court shall resort to the various legal elements of proof, including publication of inserts in local and foreign newspapers, if necessary, and the various means of advertising, which the court shall deem useful, as well as taking into account presumptions, especially in the cases and situations where the probability of death prevails without a body being found.

Article 36 (as amended by law N° 434 of May 15, 1995) The heirs of the missing person, whose death has been declared by judgment, can enjoy his estate, but shall not be allowed to transfer ownership of the property or entail it before a period of six years as of the publication of the judgment, declaring the death in the local papers and in those of the country where he might be, has elapsed, and at the end of a period of six months as of the said publication.

Article 37 Should the missing person inherit from a third party or be the beneficiary of a bequest, his share shall be left in abeyance for five years as of the judgment declaring the death. At the end of that period, his share of the estate shall devolve to the heirs of the deceased, and his bequest shall devolve to the heirs of the testator.

Article 38 Should the missing person reappear within a period of five years as of the judgment declaring the death, he shall recover all his estate from his heirs, as well as any inherit- ed shares or bequest remaining in abeyance. Should he reappear after the period of five years has elapsed, he shall recover whatever assets still remain with the heirs. However, that does not prevent him from retrieving the share of this estate acquired mala fide (in bad faith) by third parties.

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Image in Crisis: The Case of Hajj Metwalli’s Family

Samia Mehrez Translated from Arabic by Rasha Salti

Once again, as is the case every etc.The shows summon the family year, Egyptian television greeted us to gather around them, in its smaller during the 2001 Ramadan season single unit or in the context of larg- with an awesome mass of TV series, er family gatherings.The unraveling exclusively fashioned for Ramadan. of events govern the process of The Arab viewer, who would have digestion, only to be interrupted by, just broken his/her fast with the or concluded with, heated discus- typically heavy Ramadan meal, iftar, sions, accompanied by tea and could slip into a state of drowsiness Ramadan’s traditional sweets.The and fall with abandonment in front debate spills over, onto the streets of the small screen.Watching televi- and overruns public spaces, hover- sion – after decades of special ing over that viewer who thought programming, produced specifically he/she could flee the family setting for these post-iftar hours during the and rebel against its dominion. It Holy month of Ramadan – is an travels across continents and the activity that hinders the already well-guarded national borders that arduous process of digestion, with the Arab viewer finds increasingly an intensity that almost brings the difficult to cross, particularly post process to a halt. September 11.There is no escaping It has become safe to say that, in Egyptian television series during general, the typical Arab viewer has Ramadan. Even those of my ilk, who a special appetite for Ramadan serial do not watch television, are television programming.These series entrapped, after constantly schem- dominate the small screen because ing to avoid the lure of the small they are aired at prime-time, in the screen, and bound by a commit- time bracket when the entire family ment to write a paper on Ramadan gathers around the television screen television series. at the end of their meal, a captive Since the keepers of the audience that rarely has occasion to Egyptian media industry are fully reunite in its entirety during the aware of the power of this year, as the father may be out or Ramadan siege and of its commer- the mother busy with the children, cial and economic returns, they 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 51

have not spared any effort to invest from a constructive or corrective in the most qualified, available talent drive aimed, in its entirety, at coerc- in terms of scriptwriting, direction, ing and disseminating values performance and set design, to intended to protect the construc- pleasantly surprise their restfully tion of the collective image. reclined spectator. Commercial production Ramadan series are created with becomes a social text in the midst the understanding that their target of debates, articles and dialogues market is a family audience, one whose broader lines are drawn which crosses the class divide and from judgments and commentaries encompasses both the poor and the on the series, whether laudatory or wealthy.The producers, particularly negative. Every year, one of the at the level of scriptwriting, have series programmed for Ramadan thus directed their focus towards succeeds in grabbing public atten- the social themes deemed best suit- tion, and in the rewriting of that ed for the collective viewership – collective social text – a ritualised including the children of the nation confirmation to viewers and com- – who is expected to engage with mentators alike of their belonging the shows despite differences in age, to the imagined nation and to the gender, class and creed. imagined community or collectivity, From the moment of their incep- bound by the least common tion in the 1960s, state television and denominator of shared meanings other media institutions have been and signs in the past and present, keenly aware of the national role of regardless of how conflicting the the small screen as a tool for awak- readings and commentaries of that ening audiences and shaping their one series appear to be. consciousness.They consider televi- In the past two decades, the offi- sion to be a privileged tool, utilised cial discourse, disseminated by the for elaborating and disseminating a Egyptian state’s media apparatus, collective imaginary.They use it, appears as immature and precarious more or less directly, to mould a as the institutions from which it was representation of society in accor- spawned, weakened by its unrelent- dance with the outlook of state ing effort to absorb the dichotomous policies and national ideological prevailing liberal and Islamic discours- transformations, continuously casting es.This current status contrasts and recasting values onto the exist- sharply with the 1960s, when state ing collective of values and thus, institutions effectively familiarised ensuring their safe-keeping. audiences with a unified, clearly Even when a television series organised discourse, cast in a nation- ventures into lashing out a critique alist, modernist, progressive and of the reality of economic and bourgeois vocabulary.The institution social disparity or changes in moral of the media has now become the values, deemed to threaten the staging area for the production of a construction of the imagined and discourse that aims at ‘hitting two the real family – from the point of birds with one stone’, so to speak – view of the institutions representing at pleasing, or alienating, for that mat- the state – , the critique, itself, stems ter, the right and the left, the Islamist

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and the secular, the traditional and the imagined nation, community and the modernist, – so as to impose a collectivity. On the other hand, state-set sense of authority – on the worldwide satellite television broad- concert of contradicting and com- cast has provided the producer of peting discourses and values in the the television serial drama with a public sphere. new realm, not necessarily positive The position of Egypt as the or progressive, free from the stan- primary exporter of television dards of official representation. series in the Arab world, specifically Last Ramadan (November and in the market of the Ramadan December 2001), Egyptian televi- season, has muddled the landscape sion aired a series entitled A’ai’lat even further. As Arab satellite sta- Al-Hajj Metwalli (Hajj Metwalli’s tions have widened the scope of Family), in the midst of all these their broadcasts to include a world- transformations, flaring an uproar wide audience, producers, and never witnessed before. In past more specifically, the producers of years, series such as Layali al- specialised television programming Hilmiyyah (The Dreamlike Nights), for Ramadan, have had to take note Al- A’ai’lah (The Family), or Awan al- of such transformations in the Ward (Time of the Roses) generated profiling of their viewership.They no intense, albeit one-sided, debates longer fashion series exclusively with during and after their broadcast. the Egyptian family in mind, but they The Hajj Metwalli and his family have to make allowances for the invaded the lives of Egyptian fami- wider Arab ‘satellite broadcast’ family lies and their Arab ‘satellite’ kin, audience, at the very least. overshadowing any – and every- Moreover, they have had to adjust thing else broadcast on the small their considerations of that family’s screen during this prime-time values, expectations of storytelling bracket, including the bombing of and construction of drama.They Afghanistan and daily Israeli have also had to contend with the invasions into Palestinian cities. limitations that such expectations From the first instance of the have brought to the marketing and series’ broadcast, the principal pre- distribution of television series occupation of Arab satellite throughout the Arab region. In other television stations, in addition to words, the ‘globalisation’ of Ramadan other debate forums such as clubs, serial television production has unions and radio stations, was to brought forth a new set of con- host the series’ superstar Nour el- tentions and contradictions to their Sherif, and interrogate him authors, who are subsumed in the unrelentingly on his opinion of drive to please all, while sailing safely polygamy, with the intention of through the multiple boundaries of extracting a definitive, crystal-clear, censorship in their native country absolute rejection of that social and fellow Arab countries. phenomenon, all the while getting Notably, the authority of the him to reiterate his tremendous Egyptian state has been impacted in love for his real wife, Pussy. its attempts to produce an image The story-controversy of Hajj consistent with its representation of Metwalli is, briefly, the story of the 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 53

social rise of Metwalli, a self-made where all are obedient, happy and man, beginning with his life as a extremely content, and ‘all live ‘boy’, working for Mu’allem Salamah, happily ever after’. And, thus the the large textile merchant, and story ends.That image sealed the achieving the height of wealth and representation of the Egyptian family power after the death of his master. and the Arab satellite family. Metwalli’s climb up the social ladder The series touched on a number begins with his marriage to his late of social issues widely identified as master’s wealthy widow, who dies problematic in prevailing currents in soon enough, leaving him with the contemporary Egyptian society, such opportunity to marry four other as the growing number of unmarried women. Parallels were being drawn women (or widely spreading spin- between the story of Hajj Metwalli, sterhood), an increase in polygamy, unfolding on the small screen, and the retreat of modernist or liberal that of Hajj Medhat al-Suweyrki, values as symbolised in women’s which was unfolding concurrently rights, women’s education and family on the pages of the press.The lat- planning, the shattering of basic fami- ter’s story concludes with the ly and social values and the rise to Egyptian state indicting Hajj al- prominence of a new class of par- Suweyrki to a seven-year jail venus and nouveaux riches.The tone sentence for breaching the laws of with which the series shaped its polygamy by marrying more than approach mixed fantasy, satire and four women at once. explicit exaggeration. Nevertheless, a notable differ- While a framework of light- ence separates Hajj Metwalli from hearted sarcasm overshadowed the Hajj el-Suweyrki, owner of the chain complexity, reality and gravity of of Tawheed and Noor stores in Egypt. these issues, it nonetheless marked a Hajj el-Suweyrki’s accumulation of contrast with the more familiar, long- wives was driven by sexual urges. established pattern in which He married and took advantage of television series approached such impoverished young women, who issues, namely with the absence of eventually turned on him and clear judgements or moral indict- reported him to the authorities.The ments of those social manifestations smart-talking Hajj Metwalli’s accumu- deemed nefarious. For instance, lation, on the other hand, is driven Mustafa Muharram, the author of by material calculations. He marries the text, chose not to demean the his four wives with designs to framework in which Hajj Metwalli accrue his power and wealth, and his totally subordinate family improve his social standing and his evolved. Moreover, he decidedly connections within the public depicted Hajj Metwalli’s dominion as administration.While the Hajj el- positive.The representation of the Suweyrki ‘series’ concludes with a jail man as polygamous, opportunist, sentence, the Hajj Metwalli series domineering and socially ambitious ends with his personage, a progeni- was presented in affectionate terms. tor – the absolute ruler, sitting Hajj Metwalli was surrounded by a cross-legged atop a small empire cast of women he ordered ‘to be or comprised of women and money not to be’… this, at the cadence of

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one episode after another, except that certainly begs for further study for one, to which I shall return in of what it signified with regard to the due time. representation of the crisis and the Despite the complete absence of crisis of representation in current an analytic dimension, the series was Egyptian society. undoubtedly held together by the The range of social issues that stellar performance of its cast, with the series approached was, in reality, the great artist – popular far and nothing new for its audience.The wide across the Arab world – Nour question of polygamy has been el-Sherif, at its helm.The calibre of exhausted by the media and has the actors’ delivery explains the generated a tremendous amount of unprecedented success of the series, relentless debate, as has the question despite the conservative, reactionary of the retreat of moral values in the discourse in which the daily install- face of materialism. Hajj Metwalli is, ment, totalling thirty-four episodes, as a character, not far from that of was laid out. Its success can be Ahmad Abdel Jawad, the patriarchal paired with the success reaped by dictator in Naguib Mahfouz’s trilogy, the American series Dallas, which which generations of Egyptians were invaded the entire world a few raised on during the second half of decades ago and perhaps supersed- the twentieth century. ed Hajj Metwalli in its conservative Where is the novelty, then? reactionary outlook, including its The novelty, from a personal per- simultaneous treatment of progres- spective, lies in the absence of a sive and regressive family structures. ‘lesson-to-be-learned’ moral structur- The social text of Hajj Metwalli’s ing to the story.There is no Family seemed intricately and pro- one-sided or unilateral voice or foundly constructed. It interrogated, reading, captioned with a negative through the bias of the discourses judgement cast on those conserva- that formed around it, on varying tive, reactionary values that present a levels – whether in the written or real threat to the construct of the audio-visual media – , a phenomenon modern family, as perceived by the official collective image – ‘official’, in this context, representing a strictly discursive or rhetorical concern, and not that of the level of policy or government action. Quite in contrast to Mahfouz’s trilogy, which ends with the death of the domineering patriarch and frees the path for his son, the Hajj Metwalli series ends with the patriarch squatting cross-legged on his throne, dominating his son, thwarting all of the son’s attempts to escape or to reject the father-figure’s authority and backward values. The absence of the accustomed ‘lesson-to-be-learned’, or ‘moral of 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 55

the story’, flared an awesome moment, honoured Hajj Metwalli amount of reaction from the recipi- by lending his name and the name ents of the series; reactions that of his family members to a variety depict, in their intensity, an image of of traditional garb, as they per- the comedic crisis and the crisis of ceived him as a genial entrepreneur comedy in Arab society, whether who had succeeded in reviving the on the social, economic or political textile market from a slump. On level. For instance, a large segment another scale, many saw the image of women, including a group of of ‘Meeto’ (the nickname awarded young female students at the to Hajj Metwalli by his fourth wife, American University of Cairo (who who is also an opportunist bour- later became the subject of an geois), as a representation empirical research project), pro- emerging from the absence of claimed that they would agree to social justice, the breakdown of the being a second wife on condition middle class and the superlative that their marriage provide them accumulation of wealth in the with that with which Hajj Metwalli hands of the few, abetted by the rewarded his second wife. Such government.Yet others saw in Hajj postures were considered as Metwalli’s control over his wives, mature remedies or logical alterna- progeny and the textile market, a tives to the dilemma of spinster- representation of the New World hood, and the tragedy spinsterhood Order – the embodiment of the engenders for Egyptian society.This decay of American hegemony that position resonated with the out- acts with power, control and injus- ward approval of one of Egypt’s tice, all masked under a guise of better-known clerics. spreading justice and prosperity. Moreover, we were also remind- This cursory exposé displays the ed, through the penmanship of diversity of interpretations of a sin- many, that, while polygamy was one gle text, the scope of the reception of the traditional tenets of the this text received, fastened to the Muslim community, Hajj Metwalli social location of its audience and deserved chastising for falling short its relationship to the message of undertaking the full proceedings emanating from that text.The social according to the Shari’a (Islamic location of the producers of that law) in his polygamous practice. message is not necessarily in accor- Brethren from the Arab world, who dance with that of its recipient. had hastened to embrace mod- These diverse and intersecting ernist values and thus, forbade interpretations have allowed for the themselves from practicing their outlining of a new representation traditional entitlements within Islam, of the viewer. It is no longer possi- found in Hajj Metwalli the dream of ble to operate within the a lost Eden, regarding him with the assumption of a single viewer with envious eyes of those deprived a unified, homogeneous or cogent from God’s paradise on earth. perspective, deprived of will in the Some of our Iraqi brethren, face of indoctrination by the media, those Arabs who live in anticipation whose aim is to sedate or awaken of an American assault at any him or her. In this light, the receiver

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appears as an active agent, a posi- his son Saïd, revealed the precari- tive pole in reading representations. ousness of the official discourse that So, the issue then becomes what forced its way into the text: the viewer does to the media apparatus, not what this apparatus Metwalli: ‘By the way my son, a sin- does to its audience. gle wife, good and loyal, who State agencies refused to deal loves you, is a more blessed for- with the social text and the wealth tune than many wives.” of significance that the Hajj Metwalli Saïd: “Do you mean to say that you series exposed so forcefully, but regret your many marriages?” rather regarded it as a crime! In the Metwalli: “Of course, Saïd! I wish logic of the official imaginary, the everyone could hear me and series was deemed as attacking the understand that a single wife, larger understanding, or virtues, of good and loyal, is a more blessed small families and belittling the fortune than many wives; and I importance of education.The accu- don’t want anyone to do as I sations, carried in the official press have. Moreover, one is hardly release by the Higher Council for able to cope with one… imag- Women in Egypt, stated that the ine having to cope with four!” series stood against the national policy of the Ministry of Information as Mustafa Muharram said he decreed by the state.The Hajj made sure that Nour el-Sherif Metwalli serial was aired during the repeated the same sentence,“that same time bracket as the Osama a single wife, good and loyal, is a Bin Laden serial; and, it obviously more blessed fortune than many antagonised the gruelling efforts wives”, so the message would be being made to improve the image passed on without any ambiguity to of Islam in the West. Concerned the intellectually limited, economi- entities in the Egyptian government cally, socially and politically rushed to convene with the produc- marginalised viewer, who was ers of Hajj Metwalli and their assumed to surely perceive the tel- television executives, with the aim of evision series as an open invitation inducing changes in the script and to engage in polygamy! introducing the moral directive so In reality, this intervention on blatantly absent from the narrative, behalf of the state and its agencies, as well as infusing the text with the mandated to enlighten the nation, ever familiar tone of the unilateral, confirms its persistent infantilisation unified reading. of the audience – an audience that Mustafa Muharram, the author of it perceives is in continuous need the serial, was forced to add a pas- for protection from the multitude sage in the second-to-last episode, of readings and potentialities of where the Hajj Metwalli presents a interpretations, so that their world contrived confession explaining his does not turn upside-down polygamy, claiming it was the result overnight. Despite the insertion of of deprivation from contact with the contrived moral lesson into the women in his early years because dialogue, the contradiction between he was so poor! The dialogue with the rhetoric of state policy and the 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 57

construction of the family, in particular, and society, in general, in the official collective image, as contrast- ed with those representations within the series, linger.The last image of Hajj Metwalli depicts a harmonious existence between him and his three wives, after expelling the fourth, bourgeois opportunist wife – the one depicted as childish –, from his paradise.The image of this Eden he built survives until the last frame of the series, the conclusion of which confirms that social change is not possible through rhetoric and discourse, but through effective change in the economic and political reality of society.

Samia Mehrez is an Associate Professor of Arabic Literature at the American University in Cairo. She is the author of Egyptian Writers between History and Fiction: Essays on Naguib Mahfouz, Soanallah Ibrahim and Gamal Al-Ghitani (1994). Her articles on Francophone and Modern Arabic Literature have appeared in a number of Arab and international journals.

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Early Photography in Palestine: Between Social and Imaginary Landscapes

Issam Nassar

The nineteenth century marked significance to both the worlds of the beginning of a new era in Islam and of Christianity, Palestine’s human perception and memory. weight in the life of the empire was Technological and scientific devel- rather limited. However, political opments reshaped human thinking events connected with the rise of and knowledge in ways that had colonial interests in the empire and never been possible before. with the Egyptian conquest of Syria Inventions in communications, both – which included Palestine (1831- aural and visual, changed percep- 1840) – signaled the beginning of a tions of time and space. It became new era in Ottoman openness. possible to communicate instantly They also signaled the beginning of with someone at the other end of persistent European involvement in the world, and to view images of the affairs of Palestine that would objects, people and events that have a significant political and social were distant in space and time. impact on the region.1 Photography was at the centre of Palestine’s religious significance these developments. was naturally crucial in shaping the The invention of the photo- nature of this European involvement. graphic process in 1839 had a The prominent place that it occu- far-reaching impact on how pied as the ‘Holy Land’ in Christian Palestine was presented to viewers religious imagination was essential in

1 For further information on in Europe.The introduction of forming the European worldview, Palestine in the 19th century, photography in Palestine was an which often placed Jerusalem at the see Scholch, Alexander, event that took place at a time centre of the world, not just in a Palestine in Transformation (1856-1882): Studies in Social, when the country was divided metaphorical sense, but also geo- Economic and Political among several small provincial graphically.The city and region where Development, translated by districts distant from the economic, Jesus had lived and died seemed to William C.Young and Michael C. Gerrity,Washington, D.C: cultural and political centre of the provoke an ever-growing interest in Institute for Palestine Studies, Ottoman Empire, which had ruled Christian Europe.The large number 1993. Also see Tibawi, A. L., it since 1517. Indeed, despite its of travelers and expeditions that set British Interest in Palestine 1800-1901, London: Oxford gradual growth in importance, out from various places in Europe to University Press, 1961. largely due to its religious explore the Holy Land, and the 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 59

more than two thousand books verge of collapse, the process of published on Palestine in Europe and modernisation that had begun in its American colonies between 1800 the nineteenth century in Palestine and 1878, confirm this increased level – and in many other centres in the of curiosity.2 It is in this context of Ottoman Empire – was already renewed European interest in the bearing fruit.The subsequent shift Holy Land that photography was from Ottoman to British rule fur- introduced in Palestine. ther fostered considerable growth Although more a European and development in Jerusalem. development than a modernising Under the British, Palestine ceased trend that emerged from within to be the small region within a vast Palestine itself, the arrival of photog- empire that it had been under raphy in Palestine was, like the Ottoman rule. It emerged, instead, advent of modernity in general, a as a country with its own economy process largely connected with and political life. political and social events whose If the impact these inventions centre originated in distant places. had on the region could, to a cer- And, it was also, in itself, indicative of tain extent, be easily imagined or the arrival of a new era. Early pho- inferred, that is not the case with tographic interest in Palestine was the advent of photography.True, very much linked to a complex web like many of the other inventions, of European connections to the photography drastically changed Near East at large, and to Jerusalem the way people related to time and in particular. Prominent among such space. But only photography, with connections were the colonial and the revolution that it brought about scientific interests in the region, the in memory and knowledge, had the romantic passion for imaginary and special power to reshape the past exotic sites and a revived Christian and, subsequently, the present. interest in biblical studies.3 Indeed, the introduction of photog- As with the earlier experience raphy in the region by Europeans in Europe, the inception of the positioned them in a special modern age in the region was vantage point to ‘redefine’ or marked by a number of develop- ‘reconstruct’ the history of ments in knowledge and Jerusalem and of the Holy Land. 2 Rohricht, Reinhold, Bibliotheca Geographica Palestinae, London: technology. Photography, one of the 1989 Early European John Trotter Reprints, ,pp. first in a series of inventions, also 338-587. constituted the first sign of the Photography of Palestine 3 For Further elaboration on this arrival of the age of modernity in Photography arrived in Palestine see, Nassar, Issam, Photographing the region. It was followed by a in 1839, the same year in which Jerusalem:The Image of the City in number of other inventions such as Daguerre announced his invention Nineteenth-Century Photography, 4 Boulder: East European the telegraph, the telephone, the to the world. By the middle of the Monographs, 1997,pp.25-30. bicycle, the automobile and the 19th century, pictures and images of 4 Daguerre’s announcement was plane, all of which were powerful Jerusalem, Nazareth and Bethlehem made in August 1839.In signs of the modern, industrial and were already popular in Europe December of the same year, rational age. and its Western colonies. Horace Vernet and Frédéric 1948 Goupil-Fesquet arrived in Ironically, by , when Arab Depictions of these towns, particu- Palestine with the intention of society in Palestine was on the larly Jerusalem, were more readily photographing the country.

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available in art galleries and photo- nitrocellulose film – developed by graphic exhibits than those of many George Eastman in 1888 and 1891, other Asian or African cities – respectively – had made photogra- perhaps with the exception of phy easily accessible to a wider Cairo. One could find photographs public.The new negatives freed of Jerusalem exhibited alongside photographers from having to carry those of Paris and London – as the along the bulky glass-negatives that following description of an architec- they had previously used, and tural photographic exhibit, published enabled tourists to take their own in The British Journal of Photography cameras along with them to their on March 15, 1860, indicates: various destinations.While it is impossible to make an estimate, the The photographs in this exhibit are number of amateur photographers judiciously classed by countries, although who took pictures of Palestine in the various nations are unequally repre- the 19th century is likely to have sented. France and England are greatly in been considerably large.9 the majority, as might have been expected: Despite their diverse back- Next follow Spain, Rome,Venice, Jerusalem grounds and their large numbers, and its neighbourhood.5 early photographers who worked in Palestine often performed similar Indeed, the photographs in ques- functions and served a similar clien- tion were the joint work of tele. In most cases, they produced 5 ‘Architectural Photographic Robertson and Beato, two wet-plate photographs that corresponded with Exhibition’, The British Journal photographers who visited Palestine the image of Palestine as the Holy of Photography, March 15, 1860, in 1857.6 Their work, together with Land, with the purpose of selling p. 88. that of many other European them abroad, or to visiting pilgrims. 6 An early photographic process photographers at the time, made Visiting photographers from developed in 1851 that used a combination of alcohol, ether Jerusalem and with it, Palestine, a Europe dominated the scene for and guncotton to produce a place familiar to the Europeans. In quite a few years. However, little by fluid known as ‘collodion’, fact, in the same article in The British little, a different group of photogra- which would be spread over the glass-plate prior to expo- Journal of Photography, the reviewer phers, who were either from the sure in the camera. described how he actually found region or had resided in it for some

7 Ibid., p. 88. that the buildings of Jerusalem were time, began to emerge. As we see in “as familiar as… the public buildings their images, some of them contin- 8 Perez, Nissan, Focus East: Early 7 Photography in the Near East of London.” ued the type of work undertaken 1839-1885, New York: Harry In fact, we know that more than by the first visiting photographers, N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers, two hundred and fifty different while others began to employ pho- 1988,pp.124-233. photographers – most of them tography in new ways. However, the 9 The present study confined Europeans – worked in the Near diverging trends did not necessarily itself to photographs taken by 1839 professional photographers, as East between the years and correspond to whether the photog- they were more widely accessi- 1885. And, we also know that many rapher was a foreigner or a native ble to the general public – both of them photographed Palestine.8 of the area.The fact that photogra- in the Near East and in Europe – and can be considered, in One can only assume that, by the phy in the Near East was first turn, the product of a market turn of the 20th century, the num- conducted solely by Christians demand for Holy Land images. ber of photographers would have means that photography conducted As such, they better illustrate the type of photographs that been significantly higher.The gelatin- in Ottoman Palestine was more were sought by the public. plate negative and the transparent connected to a recognised millet 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 61

– a non-Muslim religious community 6. And, the photographing of simi- – than to being native to the country. lar locations from similar angles.12 This makes the ‘local versus foreign’ dichotomy highly problematic.10 The first, and most obvious, of Still, the purpose of this study is these patterns points to the fact to attempt to contrast the early that the overwhelming majority of images of Palestine produced photographs were of sites connect- before and after photography ed with biblical history.The main became a local career practiced by churches, or holy sites, of Jerusalem, people from the region. For this Bethlehem, Nazareth and others, reason, the religious division will such as the Church of the Holy not be highlighted.11 Sepulchre, the Church of the Nativity, the Ecce Homo Arch and The Image of Palestine in the Church of the Virgin were Early European Photography among the most popular sites to Although photographers trav- be photographed. elled to the Near East for various Other locations – not necessarily reasons, it could be argued that their marked by a church, but known to

common aim was to define the have biblical associations – also 10 Millet is a recognised non- Orient visually. In doing so, photog- appeared frequently in these photo- Muslim religious community in raphers often imitated each other’s graphs.The village of El-A’zariyeh the Ottoman Empire that granted the community a large work and reproduced, conceptually, (referred to in photographs as measure of internal religious ideas and images that were already Bethany), the Jordan River and the and legal autonomy.

in existence.Therefore, it is of no Mount of Olives are typical exam- 11 For an elaborate discussion on surprise that in their photographs of ples. It is particularly significant that how to best categorise early Palestine, photographers followed the captions for such photographs – photographers of Palestine see our forthcoming study on the certain patterns with regard to as in the case of El-A’zariyeh – history of photography in themes, styles, locations and tech- almost always gave biblical names, Palestine, in Arabic, commis- niques.The frequent recurrence of rather than the names used by the sioned by the A.M. Qattan Foundation in Ramallah. such patterns in commercially dis- residents of Jerusalem at the time. tributed photographs indicates that The most striking example of this is 12 These patterns resulted from an extensive study of a very there was a tradition of uniformity the continuous reference to the large number of nineteenth- in context, subject, aesthetics and mosque of the Dome of the Rock – century photographs of textual commentary. a marvellous architectonic Islamic Palestine.These photographs th include the photographic col- An overview of 19 century shrine – as The Site of Solomon’s lection of Mohammed B. Alwan photographs of Palestine, taken by Temple.The persistent disregard of (Cambridge, MA), the Bonfils non-local early photographers, the existence of the mosque went collection and the Diness collection housed at Harvard reveals the recurrence of the follow- even further in some cases. On his University’s Semitic Museum, ing patterns: 1854 photograph of the Dome of the photographic collection of 1.The predominance of religious the Rock, the Scotsman James the Palestine Exploration Fund, 21:37 the collection of the Swedish sites; Graham printed Luke on the Christian Study Centre in 13 2.The absence of local population; negative. The verse states that “in Jerusalem and my personal col- 3.The objectification of human the daytime He was teaching in the lection, which includes a few hundred photographs. figures as living proof of the Temple and at night in the mount biblical heritage; called the Mount of Olives.” 13 Graham’s photograph belongs to the collection of the Palestine 4.The staging of biblical scenes; It is rather ironic that the European Exploration Fund in London 5.The absence of nude models; photographers were able to see, on (PEF p2159).

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that site, what had existed two early photographic images of thousand years before and ignore Palestine, particularly those which what actually existed before their date from before 1867.The work of own eyes. Perhaps, in many cases, Maxime Du Camp, Auguste such ‘blindness’ simply resulted from Salzmann, Robertson and Beato and a market demand in Europe for Francis Frith, who all photographed Holy Land photographs which were Jerusalem during the 1850s, illustrate often used to illustrate Bibles, pilgrim this point. It was not until the late narratives and other religious books, 1860s that human figures started to following a tradition already set by appear more frequently in photo- 14 Phillips accompanied the Palestine Exploration Fund’s painters and engravers. graphs. It is striking that only a few of archeological mission that went The second pattern, evident in Henry Phillips’ photographs depicted to Palestine in 1867. He has often these photographs, is the general people,14 particularly in view of the been mentioned as the first photographer to take ethnographic absence of the local population. It is fact that he had been sent to photographs in Palestine. hard to find any human figures in the Palestine with the specific purpose of documenting the country. Even in the Holy Land photographs of Bonfils (late 1860s, 1870s and 1890s), famous for their staged studio portraits, human figures were absent from the Right American Colony pictures of biblical and historical sites. Church of the Holy Sepulchre. For example, we notice the complete th Jerusalem, Palestine early 20 absence of people from any of the century. Collection Widad Kawar / FAI photographs of the Dome of the © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image Rock. In the photographs of the same location by M. J. Diness (1858), Below Félix Bonfils we occasionally see a handful of The Dome of the Rock. human figures, but always from a dis- Jerusalem, Palestine, circa 1875. tance. Many other important Collection Nabila Nashashibi / FAI © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image locations, such as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre or the streets of Jerusalem and Bethlehem – the two towns that were photographed most frequently – , often appeared either empty or with a handful of people fully subordinated to the landscape.These images provoke in the viewer the feeling that Palestine was an empty place, as some of the most lively places in towns were reduced to sites of ancient, uninhabited ruins. There are a few, typical occasions where this trend seems to have been broken. Many photographs of the front façade of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre were taken during 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 63

the busy Easter season, with large human figure in their photographs of crowds in evidence. Despite their archeological sites, most likely with popularity, these photographs do little the mere intention of establishing a to undermine the image of the rest sense of scale. of Palestine as an empty place, due The absence of the Palestinian to the association of the large crowd population from most photographs in a special season and a special loca- was also derived partially from their tion. Furthermore, when captions own hostility towards the intruding were used, they seemed to have had European photographers and their the effect of downplaying the signifi- intimidating cameras, which violated cance of the people present in the religious codes sacred to both images. A good example is the pho- Muslims and Jews. But this appre- tograph taken in 1901 by Dwight hension was probably not the only Elmendorf of the outside of the reason. Chances are, the Palestinian Church of the Holy Sepulchre on population’s absence reflected the Easter Sunday, in which we see the fact that they were also absent, at crowds attempting to enter through some level, from the mind and con- the doors of the Church.The caption sciousness of the European or to the photograph, The Throng of American photographer. In his mind, Pilgrims and Others,15 might indicate the city was reduced to a location the reason behind his photographing that could attest to the truth of a human figures. By describing most of biblical story, rather than be recog- the people in the photograph as pil- nised as a real place in this world. grims, the caption emphasised the The American photographer authenticity of the location as a holy Edward L.Wilson, who pho- site, and reduced the local population tographed Palestine in the 1880s, in the region to mere ‘others’. corroborates this point in a striking No doubt, certain technical limita- way. In an article that appeared in tions (such as the long exposure Century Magazine,Wilson actually time needed to capture an image stated that the peasants he encoun- photographically) had an important tered near the Sea of Galilee were impact on the photographers’ choice “repulsive,” adding that,“they are not to photograph moving objects. entirely out of harmony with the 17 However, it is highly doubtful that character of the Land.” But, it is 15 Elmendorf, D., A Camera these limitations fully explain why interesting to note that even the Crusade Through The Holy Land, human figures did not appear in the photographers who, unlike Wilson, plate LXXVIII. early photographs of Palestine. Even were favourably impressed by the 16 An early photographic process though Maxime Du Camp used the people of Palestine, avoided includ- developed by Talbot that required a long exposure time. calotype process,16 he was able to ing them in their photographs.The capture some human figures in his Scottish photographer John Cramb 17 Wilson, Edward L., In Scripture Lands,p.265, quoted in Davis, photographs of Egypt.That he suc- wrote of his disappointment at not John, The Landscape of Belief, ceeded in photographing people in being able to photograph the Princeton: Princeton University Egypt, perhaps through payments to women of Bethlehem – who he Press, 1996,p.87. the posing Egyptians, indicates a deci- thought were beautiful – , adding 18 Cramb, John,‘Palestine in 1860; sion, on his part, not to do the same that it was unfortunate that he was Or, A Photographer’s Journal of a Visit to Jerusalem’, The British in Palestine. Similarly, McDonald and “not expected to spend my time Journal of Photography,No.X, Philips, among others, often had a [photographing] such subjects.18 November 1, 1861,p.388.

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19 Nir,Yeshayahu, The Bible and It would appear that, like Cramb, movement half a century later.21 the Image, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania other photographers thought that The third pattern mentioned Press, 1985,p.135. their buyers would resent having previously – the objectification of

20 Doumani, Beshara, photographs of important sites human figures as proof of biblical ‘Rediscovering Ottoman being desecrated by the inclusion of accounts – points to the fact that, Palestine:Writing Palestinians Arabs,Turks and Jews.19 This “amaz- when people were included in the into History’, Journal of Palestine Studies,Vol. XXI, No. 2,Winter ing ability to discover the land commercially distributed photo- 1992,p.7. without discovering the people,”20 graphs, their inclusion was often

21 The slogan,“a land without a to use the words of Beshara intended as an illustration of people for a people without a Doumani, may very well have paved Palestine’s biblical heritage. Images land,” has been used by the the way for the emergence of the of shepherds in the vast, arid land- Zionist movement to justify its claims to Palestine. David Ron popular mythical image of Palestine scape of the mountains, or of a few attributes this slogan to Chaim as a land without a people, which fishermen at the Sea of Galilee Weizman, the long-time presi- became a slogan of the Zionist were among the most popular dent of the World Zionist Organisation. See Ron, David, photographs of this type.The Arabs and Israel for Beginners, choice to include human figures New York:Writers & Readers was often intended to invoke some Pub., 1993,p.94. For further discussion on how Zionism particular biblical message.The presented Palestine as an ‘empty’ image of the shepherds in the fields land, see Schoenman, Ralph, The invokes the biblical story of the Hidden History of Zionism, Santa Barbra:Veritas Press, 1988,p.16. birth of Jesus; a woman getting water from a well invokes the scene of Jesus with the Samaritan Right woman; and women near the Underwood and Underwood Fishermen in the Sea of entrance of a cave recalls the scene Gallilee stereoscope. of the resurrection. Some photog- Palestine, circa 1900. raphers, like Dwight Elmendorf, Collection Issam Nassar went even further, and listed the Below particular biblical verses relevant to Eric Matson the depicted image on the back of Shepards and flock near Bethlehem their photographs. Palestine, circa 1920s. Another example of the objectification of Palestinians is the photograph taken by Bonfils, in the 1870s, of an old peasant man talking to an old peasant woman in a field of wheat.The caption described the scene as The Field of Boaz. Elmendorf – who copied the same setting in a photo of an old peasant couple in a wheat field – went even further, describing the couple in his caption as Ruth and Boaz. This type of photograph was rather normative among the commercially distributed stereoscopic collections. In a stereoscope from 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 65

the Keystone View company, we graphic genre. He photographed see the plateau between al-Aqsa people, especially women, dressed Mosque and the Dome of the in the different Palestinian traditional Rock filled with people.The caption costumes. In his written identifica- for this card describes the scene as tions, his subjects were associated Mohammedan Pilgrims in Temple with towns and villages that had Area, Jerusalem. However, if we biblical connotations. An example of examine the back of the card, we Dumas’ captions is the two photo- get a better idea of why Muslim graphs, A Woman From Bethlehem, pilgrims were photographed in the and A Man From Bethany. first place. Among other things, the However, it is rather hard to text on the back states: accept fully the authenticity of some of the featured characters This is a Mohammedan festival; but it because, in a number of cases, the may illustrate many events in Bible history. subjects of the photographs appear When, a little less than a thousand years to have been posing models. A before Christ, on that plateau arose the good example of this can be found walls and pinnacles of Solomon’s newly in the Bonfils’ collection, where the 22 In the Bonfils photographic col- built temple, walked up those steps with same person appears in two differ- lection, at the Harvard Semitic songs and trumpets and harps, King ent photographs, identified in one Museum (HSM), these two Solomon, in royal robes and crown, leading as a cotton carder and in the other, photographs were classified as 22 4E1 and 4E2. See Gavin, the procession. When two centuries after as the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem. Carney E. S., The Image of the Solomon, King Hezekiah held a great Similarly, in one of Dumas’ East,p.78. Passover and people came from all parts photographs, the posing subject is of the land, there was a congregation like identified as the Maronite Patriarch Below this before us… of Jerusalem – an office that never Félix Bonfils existed. Moreover, such models Market place in Bethlehem. Not only did the immediate were not representative of the Bethlehem, Palestine, circa 1875. Collection Nabila Nashashibi / FAI reality serve to illustrate only cer- country’s population because they © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image tain past events, but the information was also historically inaccurate. For the text also states, in passing, that the Dome of the Rock that appears in the photograph was built in the 10th century after Christ, when, in fact, it dates back to the end of the 7 th century. The process of turning Palestinian peasants into biblical icons had its counterpart in the genre of staged studio portraits, which became fashionable in the last two decades of the 19th century.The work of Tancrède R. Dumas – employed in the late 1870s by the American Palestine Exploration Society – exemplifies this photo-

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represented, in most of these pho- Lessons of Jesus,23 for instance, we tographs, members of the smallest see a man dressed as an Armenian minorities in Palestine, such as the monk, walking away from another Samaritans, Armenians and Bedouins. man lying on the ground, while a The objectification of Palestinian third person, dressed in a Palestinian figures often occurred in conjunc- peasant dress, having stepped down tion with the fourth pattern listed from his horse, assists the man on previously, namely, the staging of bib- the ground.The caption reads On lical scenes. It is sometimes difficult the Road to Jericho:The Parable of the to determine whether some of the Good Samaritan. photographs were staged or were This photograph is representa- 23 This collection was designed and its text authored by Rev. simply realistic scenes, which the tive of a large number of similar William Byron Forbush and dis- photographers’ manipulations trans- situations that were staged to tributed by Underwood and formed into some sort of biblical reflect biblical scenes. Among these, Underwood publishers in the 1890s. allegorical image.This type of pho- a large number of photographs tography was particularly popular show people with deformities – 24 Hurlbut, Jesse Lyman, Jerusalem through the Stereoscope, New among producers of stereoscopic most notably, lepers – who invoke York: Underwood and images. In a stereoscopic card from the biblical story of Jesus healing Underwood, 1908,p.91. the collection entitled The Travel the lepers. However, the biblical image is not the only message in the photographs of lepers that can be found in all the stereoscopic collections published on Palestine. The caption, Unclean Wretched Lepers Outside Jerusalem, appeared on the back of all such stereo- scopes from Underwood and Right Underwood.The accompanying Underwood and Underwood On the Road to Jericho, the guide to the collection, Jerusalem Parable of the Good Samaritan. through the Stereoscope, notes that, Stereoscope from The Travel “there are generally forty to fifty of Lessons on the Life of Jesus. Palestine, 1899 them outside the city,” adding that Collection Issam Nassar such a deadly “disease of sin” is hereditary, for “every man inherits [it] from a line of sinning ancestors… which no human power can cure”.24 The text also suggests a certain European chauvinism toward these “deformed, unclean and underdeveloped” inhabitants of the Holy Land. Right Incidentally, the staging of biblical Underwood and Underwood th “Unclean! Unclean!”Wretched scenes was not limited to 19 cen- lepers outside Jerusalem. tury photographic images, but Stereoscope from The Travel continued throughout the British Lessons on the Life of Jesus. 1917 1948 Jerusalem, Palestine, 1897 Mandate period ( - ). In a Collection Issam Nassar photograph by Swedish Eric 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 67

25 Matson, taken either in the 1920s on her head with one of her 25 This photograph does not rep- or the 1930s, and entitled the breasts exposed.27 In the catalogue resent the core of the 26 photographic work of Eric Judean Home, the exterior of a of Bonfils photographs, one of these Matson. He was the photogra- very old construction, resembling a women is described as a Bedouin pher of the American Colony grotto, can be seen. A father figure from Jericho. It is also interesting to in Jerusalem; and his large collection, housed at the Library stands before the structure, while a note the resemblance between this of Congress, fully documented mother figure, holding a baby in her and another, almost identical, the Near East, its geography arms, sits on the ground. Another photograph taken by Tancrède and its people. man and two camels can also be Dumas around the same time. In 26 Graham-Brown, Sarah, Palestinians seen in the photograph.The resem- this photograph, we see a woman and their Society 1880-1946, New York: Quartet Books, 1980,p.1. blance between this tableau and standing, holding a bundle of wood, the Nativity scene can hardly be with her breast exposed. Dumas 27 Photographs 4F4 and 4F9 in the HSM collection. See Gavin, assumed as coincidental. entitled this photograph A Bedouin Carney E. S., The Image of the The fifth pattern acquires its East,p.79. significance from its absence. It is almost impossible to find any 19th century photographs of Palestine that correspond to the image of the exotic Orient. It was rather fashionable among European photographers of the East, including some of the same photographers who visited Palestine, to take photographs of nude women in other places (often identified as Algerian, Nubian, Moorish or Bedouin). While the absence of such images from the photographs of Palestine might suggest a desire on Left Eric Matson the part of the photographers to The Judean Home. respect the sanctity of the land of Circa 1920s. Jesus, its religious ceremonies and clergy, it may also indicate that European photographers did not view Palestine as a location that was part of the Orient. Rather, it was a familiar site, very well known to the Europeans and often claimed by them. It is interesting to note, in this regard, that photographs of nude women were not totally absent

from photographs of the rest of Left Palestine. In the Bonfils collection, Bonfils for example, there are at least two A Beduin from Jericho in Jerusalem. different photographs that show a Jerusalem, Palestine 1880s. woman carrying a bundle of wood Collection Mohammad B. Alwan

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from Beirut.The similarity between are formulated.30 The market demand the two images can easily be seen for Holy Land images, coupled with in the context of the next pattern. their dissemination through publica- Numerous photographs of the tions and exhibitions, only confirms same locations, taken from the same that an authoritative, popular view of angle, even when the sites had no Palestine was in existence in both apparent special significance, repre- Europe and America. In this sense, sent the last pattern I would like to 19th century photographs of Palestine discuss. Several photographs taken by were not only about representing Bonfils and by the photographers of the country’s landscape, but they also the American Colony, among others, revealed something very significant show the same scene that they about the way in which Europeans labelled First View of Jerusalem.These thought of themselves and of the photographs even show a similar world around them, at that particular number of animals and people in the juncture in history.The images, pre- same locations.28 This replication indi- sented in the photographs, cates that what we have is more corresponded to the popular image than a simple case of new photogra- of Palestine as the Holy Land, at least phers following the lead of earlier in the same sense that contemporary ones. Such frequent duplications travel literature represented it.They reveal that a photographic tradition also paralleled the general attitude of had been established in the minds of the colonial European powers the photographers, which they felt towards Palestine. It is in this context obliged to follow. It was as if any site, that studying how Palestine was rep- previously photographed in the Holy resented by local photography Land, had acquired some meaning becomes even more significant. that every new photographer felt a Questions relating to how native need to document. photographers employed photogra- A point, which needs to be reit- phy, and how they represented their erated is that there is “no such thing land and lives become central in light as one, definitive meaning of a text of the image of Palestine in early or image.”29 Rather, different possible European photography. 28 These photographs are representatives of many others. meanings originate from different Commercial photographers readings of the same text or image. Local Photographers or Photography: were regularly copying each These readings depend very much The Problem of Definition others work and depicting the same sites. A general compari- upon the particular experiences of As implied above, the overwhelm- son between the works of the readers/viewers and the histori- ing majority of the 19th century Bonfils, Dumas and Zangaki cal and cultural contexts in which photographers of Palestine were, in clearly illustrates this point. they are being constructed. fact, Europeans.The few exceptions 29 Felicity Edhom,‘Beyond The However, it is important to empha- to this rule were Ottoman subjects Mirror:Women’s Self Portraits,’ in Imagining Women: Cultural sise that photographers are not from regions quite distant from Representations and Gender, always fully aware of all the possible Palestine. It was not until the end of edited by Bonner, F., Goodman, meanings for the images they pro- the 19th century that a photographic L., Allen, R., Jones, L. and King, C., Cambridge MA: Polity Press duce, as they are subject to various tradition, which can arguably be in association with The Open kinds of unconscious processes called local, began to emerge.Three University, 1992,p.158. through which connections with pre- photographic studios had been 30 Ibid., p. 158. viously existing concepts and ideas established in Jerusalem and, at least 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 69

one in Jaffa, by the turn of the However, if localism were to be century. By the early 20th century, defined in ethnic or linguistic terms, photography was a local career and a Diness certainly would not qualify number of photographic establish- as ‘local’.The same could be said 31 It is important to note that the ments in the country began to serve were we to adopt, for the sake of forefather of local photography, the growing demand for photo- argument, the far-fetched Zionist Yessayi Garabedian, described graphs in local society.31 paradigm that makes every Jew a his fascination with photography in his memoirs using the However, before venturing to native of Palestine, especially in light Armenian word arhest [meaning narrate a history of local photogra- of the fact that Diness had con- craft] instead of the word arvest phy in Palestine, it is necessary to verted to Protestantism. Similarly, if [which means art]. See Victor- Hummel, Ruth, Culture and attempt to clarify what ‘local’ pho- ‘local’ denoted Ottoman citizenship, Image: Christians and the tography signifies.The traditional Diness would also fail to fit the Beginnings of Local Photography in th definition of ‘local’ as exclusively description as he was a Russian, 19 Century Ottoman Palestine, in O’Mahony,A.; Gunner, G. and determined by the photographer’s who remained in Palestine under Hitlian, K., The Christian Heritage birthplace, family ties, residency or the protection of the British con- in the Holy Land, Jerusalem: ethnicity can be problematic in the sulate in Jerusalem.33 Swedish Christian Study Centre, 1995,p.186. context of Palestine, in light of both Defining ‘local’ is, essentially, a the Jewish immigration and the theoretical problem. According to 32 See Wahrman, Dror, Mendel Diness: Jerusalem’s First unusually large number of foreign the Oxford dictionary, it refers to a Professional Photographer?, see residents in the country. In addition, state characterised by an attach- Cathedra for the History of ‘native’ photographers regularly ment to a certain locality and by Eretz Israel and its Yishuv,Vol. 38, 1985,pp.115-120 (Hebrew). worked for, and with, their foreign “interests arising out of such attach- counterparts – often producing ments.”34 The production of locality, 33 Because Diness converted to Christianity, he was shunned by images that served the growing in my view, is a process that evolves the Jewish community in tourist market in a fashion not very through history, and is based on the Palestine, which tried to physi- different from that which was pro- idea of the negation of what is ‘not cally harm him, and, in fact, managed to take his wife and duced by European photographers. local’. In this process, several ele- children away from him. As a Part of the difficulty in the defini- ments are at play, which cannot be result, Diness sought refuge at tion is instigated by the way in reduced merely to the spatial ele- the house of the British Consul in Jerusalem. It was in that which the history of Palestine itself ment. Locality, as Appadurai has house, with the help of the serves as an arena for contestation. argued, is connected more with consul’s wife, Mrs. Finn, that Illustrating the complexity of this relations and contexts than with Diness first learned of photography. He worked in Jerusalem characterisation of who is ‘local’ and places and location. Locality is capturing images of both the who is ‘not local’ is the case of the essentially a quality that is “consti- place and of Ottoman rule photographer Mendel Diness, a tuted by a series of links between before he left in 1860 to the United States, never to return. Russian immigrant and an early the sense of social immediacy, the For more information on M.J. photographer, who worked in technologies of interactivity and the Diness, see Capturing the Holy Jerusalem in the 1850s. Some Israeli relativity of contexts.”35 In other Land: M.J. Diness and the Beginnings of Photography in photography historians recently words, locality becomes an issue Jerusalem, Cambridge: Harvard argued that, in fact, Diness was connected more with social context Semitic Museum, 1993.

“Jerusalem’s first professional pho- than with the physical location: It is 34 The New Shorter Oxford English tographer.”32 His Jewish origin, and the context in which images are Dictionary,Thumb Index the fact that he had been intro- produced, exchanged, viewed and Edition, 1993, s.v.“Localism.” duced to photography in Jerusalem, assigned meanings that must be 35 Appaudrai, Arjun, Modernity at were used as the basis for the placed at the core of our attempt Large: Cultural Dynamics of Globalization, Minneapolis: claim that Diness was the first ‘local’ to differentiate between what is University of Minnesota Press, photographer in Palestine. local from what is not. In this 1960,p.178.

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context, the subject of the photo- were also produced for the benefit graph becomes crucial, since it is of the town, despite the fact that obvious that the different markets Grant himself was an outsider.36 The of exchange were interested in the same could be said of some of the image because of what it depicted, work of the photographers of the and also by its subject’s relation to American Colony in Jerusalem. the community in question. Christian Europe, for instance, was Early Local Photography and interested in Holy Land images the Question of Representation much more than it was interested Photography, as a new craft in the people of Palestine. practiced by the local population In light of the above discussion, of Palestine, began as early as the it may be safe to claim that, in 1860s, when the Armenian Palestine, it was the image – and Patriarch,Yassayi Garabedian, estab- not the photographer – that mat- lished a workshop in Jerusalem for tered the most. If the picture the purposes of training young depicted the desired image, then it Armenians in photography. It was a was in demand – regardless of who while before the first Palestinian had produced it.Therefore, in actually opened a studio in examining the emergence of local Palestine. In 1885, the Armenian photography, it becomes fruitless to Garabed Krikorian, a student of focus exclusively on the national, Garabedian, established the first ethnic or religious identity of the photographic studio in Jerusalem. photographers at the expense of From this studio, two more impor- the work they produced, and the tant, local photographers of relation of the latter to local socie- Palestine began their careers.The ty.Whether the photographers first was Khalil Raad, who subse- were Armenians, Arabs or quently opened his own shop in European residents; Muslims, Jerusalem, in 1890; the second was Christians or Jews, the work that Johhanes, the son of Krikorian, who they produced, relative to the fabric took over his father’s work and of Palestinian society at that time, studio around 1913.Two years after confers the quality ‘local’ upon Raad, Issa Sawabini opened a them, in contrast with the photog- studio in Jaffa. raphy that we have already defined As the 20th century began to as ‘non-local’ (photography that unfold, more and more people in produced images in response to Palestine took up photography as European market demands, as well their career of choice. Among the as Zionist photography that was many who worked in Jerusalem, connected exclusively with the Bethlehem, Jaffa and Nazareth, 36 Photographs taken by Grant Jewish settlement project in among other places, were Hanna were printed in The Ramallah Palestine). In this sense, Safieh (1910-1969), Ali Za’rour Messenger, the newsletter of 1901-1972 the Society of Friends in New photographs of Ramallah taken by ( ), Anton and Joseph England. See Shaheen, the American Elihu Grant, from Mikhail Carmi, Sama’an al-Sah’har, Nasseb, A Pictorial History of 1901 to 1904, can be called local the Elia studios in the Old City, Ramallah, Beirut: Arab Institute for Research and photography. Not only do they Diana (location unknown) and the Publishing, 1992,p.31. capture life in the town, but they photo dealers, Hanania Brothers 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 71

(location also unknown). Za’rour, Palestine. Furthermore, a large vol- who worked in Jerusalem from ume of their work belonged to 1936 on, was one of the first the genre of portrait photography. Muslim photographers in Palestine. This point does not negate that The Carmi brothers, on the other early European photographers – hand, were appointed as the official particularly residents with studios photographers of the Russian in the region – were not engaged Orthodox Church in Jerusalem at in the production of portraits.The the turn of the 20th century. As for significant difference lies in the Sah’har, he owned a photographic manner in which the two groups – studio that was located on the local or resident photographers – outskirts of the New Gate of the approached, related to and Old City, in the mid-1940s. produced portrait photography. Following the division of Jerusalem, A typical trend in early- his studio remained in what was European portrait photography in known as ‘No-Man’s Land’, until he Palestine showed human figures moved his practice to Bethlehem. whose identity as individuals was There is no doubt that the consistently ignored, to the point presence of a number of profes- that it can be argued that their sional local photographers, who identity was obliterated. As previ- worked in Palestine in the early ously mentioned, the people who part of the 20th century, points to appeared in the images taken by the birth of a new photographic Dumas, Bonfils and others were tradition, at least with respect to representatives of ‘types’ of people the way in which Palestine and its living in the Holy Land (refer to people were depicted. A quick Dumas’s image of A Woman from examination of a number of works Bethlehem). In a way, the choice of by early local, professional photog- pose, setting, object and subject raphers indicates that, in many was cast by the photographer; ways, the commercial photographs of Palestine, produced for the tourist market by the local photographers, were not different from those produced earlier by their European counterparts. However, images of holy sites, religious ceremonies, statesmen’s visits and general views of major cities were not the only images produced by local photographers. Much of the bulk of their photographic production was, rather, connected to the life of their com- Left Khalil Raad munity: Personal, family and other Tourists photographed in social occasions, as well as the Arab traditional clothing. photographic documentation of Jerusalem, Palestine 1925. Collection MK / FAI political changes occurring in © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image

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whereas in local photography, the they had seen in early European object of the picture was the sub- photography. For example, it was ject him- or herself. In local not uncommon for urban women photography, it was the subject to be photographed dressed as who opted to be photographed, Bedouins or Bethlehemites.The and who chose the type of pose studios of Krikorian and Raad, or image in which they wanted to among others, had various attires appear. Interestingly enough, how- from which their customers could ever, they often imitated images choose to be photographed in, disguised as other,‘more exotic’ locals.That they often chose to do so may be explained by the fact that many of the customers of the early local studios were from the wealthier and more urban seg- ments of Palestinian society. It appears that the new emerging class of urban aristocracy, which had fully adopted a European attire and style of life, also adopted the European perception of peasants and Bedouins as ‘exotic Orientals’. Despite the result of the image being very similar to Right those commonly produced by T. Dumas European photographers, the role A Woman From Bethlehem. Palestine 1889. of the individual being Collection Mohammad B. Alwan photographed – as a passive object or as an active participant in the choice of subject – remains an important distinction in the context of the present discussion. The practice of early photography reveals several important trends that dominated the work of the Jerusalem photographers at that time.The first, and perhaps most common, was production of family portraits. Many rich or middle class urban families wanted studio portraits of the entire family. This trend was rather common among Christian Arab families at Right Johannes Krikorian first, but rich urban Muslim families Najla Krikorian. quickly adopted it, as early as the Jerusalem, Palestine 1921. 1920s.The work of Johhanes Collection Aida Kawar Krikorian / FAI © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image Krikorian presents us with numerous 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 73

examples of this genre.The most that such photographs were taken typical of such photographs would for the benefit of the absent father. have the head of the household, The second trend that the man, standing in the middle of developed was associated with the photograph, while the rest of photographers from missionary the family was seated at his side, in groups that worked in Palestine. It a lower position surrounding his was rather common for missionary 37 Berger, John, Ways of Seeing, wife.The patriarchal nature of Arab schools to hire photographers in London: Penguin, 1972,pp.45 society in Palestine at the time is order to produce images showing and 47. evident in these images. A studio portrait by the Jaffa-based photographer Issa Sawabini, taken in 1911, shows the father (Alfred Roch) standing with a finger pointed towards his baby daughter (Ortineh), held by her mother (Olinda).The mother is dressed in attire that seems to suggest that she belonged to Victorian America. The photograph thus presents us with a mélange of ideas and atti- tudes belonging to various cultural trends at the time.The contrast between the postures of Mr. and Mrs. Roch in the photograph is reminiscent of John Berger’s obser- Left vation on the existence of a Anonymous convention in modern European The Lorenzo family. art where “men act and women Jerusalem, Palestine 1900. 37 Collection Leila Kardus / FAI appear”. The set-up, and the © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image father’s gesture, affirm values of patriarchy which were strictly upheld within Arab society at the time, whereas the posture of the mother suggests that she was attentive to the way she would appear to the viewers. Finally, the attire of all three reveals the emergent trend towards westernisation among the local aristocracy. As time passed, photographs of the family without the patriarch started to become more common Left Garabed Krikorian in certain regions and social classes. Alfred and Olinda Roch with Immigration to the Americas or their daughter Ortineh. war drafts, may explain the absence Jaffa, Palestine 1911. Collection Samia Salfiti / FAI of the father figure. In fact, it is likely © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image

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their charitable activities for the clergy at first, became popular benefit of their funders abroad.The among the Christian population in work of the missionary E. Grant in the early part of the 20th century. It Ramallah, in the 1910s, is a good was not uncommon for local pho- example. Grant photographed the tographic studios to occasionally people of Ramallah often, especially advertise that they specialised in those who were associated with photographing funerals. In many the Quaker school (The Friends cases, the deceased would be pho- School). His photographs often tographed in an almost standing appeared in Quaker publications, position, with the coffin pushed up published at the Quaker headquar- a little, surrounded by his/her family. ters in Philadelphia in the United The origins of the emergence of States. Photographing the graduat- this tradition in the early photogra- ing classes in the missionary phy of the Near East are unknown. schools was another area in which Nonetheless, post-mortem photog- photography was regularly raphy was not uncommon in other 38 It is important to keep in mind that the shortage of photogra- employed.This is one type of work parts of the world during that phers in Palestine, at that time, in which many local photogra- same period.This practice can be often meant that people from phers, particularly Khalil Raad and found in early American photogra- the surrounding villages and 38 towns regularly employed the Issa Sawabini, were active. phy, as well as early Indian Jaffa and the Jerusalem photog- The third trend that was com- photography. Resorting to post- raphers who were ready to mon in certain areas, primarily mortem photographs, in the case travel from town to town. areas with a significant Christian of Palestine, may well have to do 39 Pinney, Christopher, Camera population, was post-mortem with the fact that the subject was Indica:The Social Life of Indian Photographs, London: Reaktion photography (photographing the not photographed during his/her Books, 1997,p.139. deceased before or during the lifetime. It is quite possible that the funeral). Photographs of deceased subject’s last picture was his/her clergymen, especially patriarchs and first.Taking a picture with the Below bishops, can be found in the photo- deceased, surrounded by family Anonymous Saint Joseph de l’Apparition graphic archives of many churches members, was, perhaps, as school. in Palestine, dating back to the late Christopher Pinney pointed out in Jaffa, Palestine 1946. 19th century.This tradition, which his discussion of this phenomenon Collection Aida Shehadeh / FAI © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image appears to have been limited to in the case of India,“an expression of a combination of love […] and the need for grief-stricken relatives to cling to memories of the deceased.”39 This last point may explain why post-mortem photography did not fully disappear from the photographic scene, as, on occasion, pictures of the deceased can still be found today. The fourth trend in local photography is what I dub as ‘war photography’.This genre includes both studio portraits of men in army uniform, as well as pictures of 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 75

combat or events related to the from the European tradition with various wars and rebellions that regard to this subject. Clearly, pho- affected Palestine. One can find tography found its own place pictures of Palestinian men in within Palestinian society, in general, Ottoman army uniform or in and within Jerusalem, in particular, British police uniform. With the as a way of documenting social life; 40 Abdel Razak Badran was born passage of time, photographs of it is interesting to note that pho- in 1919, in Haifa. He lived between Safad and Nablus resistance fighters began to tography was, indeed, not perceived before he moved to Cairo, emerge. While the studios of as an art as much as it was viewed where he studied photography Krikorian, Raad and Sawabini pro- as a means for documenting social at the School for Applied Arts at Cairo. In 1941, he founded the duced this type of image in and private lives. Photographs which Studio for Art and Photography portrait format, Hanna Safieh, Eric suggest that the medium was used in Gaza. Matson and Ali Za’rour produced similar photographs on the field and outside the confines of the studio. As an example, several photographs by Hanna Safieh, taken in the 1940s, show leaders such as Abdel Qader al-Hussieni posing for the camera, surrounded by armed men from the al-Jihad al-Muqadas forces, which he led. Other pictures by Safieh include photographs of the Arab attack on the Jewish quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, in May 1948, as well

as the battle of the Gush Etzion Left Jewish settlement (between Antranig Bakerdjian Bethlehem and Hebron), in May British police, Palestine. Collection Antranig Bakerdjian / FAI 1948. According to an eyewitness © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image account, Safieh travelled in the tank of Abdullah al-Tal, the commanding officer of the Jordanian Army, who captured the site from the Zionist forces in 1948. Other photographs documenting the Arab Revolt of 1936 and the 1948 War can often be found in family collections and in other archives. Another photographer, whose work documented the 1948 War, was Gaza-based Abdel Razak Badran.40 The afore-mentioned trends Left attest to the existence of a local Garabed Krikorian photographic tradition in Palestine, Doctor Jamil Tuck-Tuck, which employed the medium in Jerusalem, Palestine 1915. Collection Sami Khoury / FAI ways that were significantly different © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image

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as an art form are rather rare. One the Zionist colonisation of Palestine, of these exceptions can be found which brought a number of photog- from a few photographs dating back raphers to the country, who to 1922, which reveal a man named documented the birth and the Mr. Skaff, posing in four different growth of the Jewish Yishuv. Studies positions. In an almost surreal set- on both the Zionist and the ting, one of these photographs show European traditions of photography three versions of Mr. Skaff around a with regard to Palestine are numer- dining room table, eating potatoes, ous. However, only a handful of with a head – also of Mr. Skaff – articles have been written, thus far, placed on a plate before them. about the tradition of local photography in Palestine.This study is an In Conclusion attempt to simultaneously introduce One can argue that photography a number of ‘local’ photographers in Palestine had several beginnings who have, until now, been largely and multiple histories. First, was the ignored and, more importantly, to arrival of photography, in 1839, as a carve a place into the history of European invention, which has been photography in Jerusalem for what briefly outlined in this paper, in an one may call a ‘local’ photographic attempt to establish an initial frame tradition. Needless to say, much of reference.With the intervention work remains to be done in review- of European photographers, certain ing this field. Not only is the study of ideas and traditions in photography the development of local photogra- and captions were gradually phy important for understanding the 41 Sontag, Susan, On Photography, New York: Farrar, Straus and established. Subsequently, there were advent of modernity in Jerusalem, Giroux, 1977,p.3. the ‘beginnings’ of photography as a but it also offers the social historian local career with several Armenian important material, relevant to the and Arab photographers.This initia- social changes that were taking place Below tion was largely connected to the at that time. Early local photography Anonymous Mr. Skaff in four different advent of modernity in the left us a large number of records of positions. Ottoman Empire; and in particular, political and daily life in Jerusalem. At Bethlehem, Palestine 1922. into Jerusalem.The third ‘beginning’ the same time, it provides us, today, Collection FAI © Fondation Arabe pour l’Image arose with the commencement of with a glance at how people then ‘viewed’ and ‘framed’ themselves. After all, it is important to remind ourselves of the significant role that photography plays in shaping what we know, and how we know it. As it has been wisely declared, photographers “alter and enlarge our notions of what is worth looking at and what we have a right to observe.”41

This essay is based, in part, on research I am undertaking for a forthcoming book on the history of photography in Palestine, funded by the A. M. Qattan Foundation in Ramallah, Palestine. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 77

Issam Nassar is a photography historian and the associate editor of the Jerusalem Quarterly File. He is also the associate director at the Institute of Jerusalem Studies and an assistant professor at Al-Quds University. He is the author of: Photographing Jerusalem:A Study in Nineteenth-Century European Representation (Boulder: East European Monographs, distributed by Columbia University Press, 1997); Hanna Safieh:A Man and His Camera, Photographs of Palestine, 1927-1967 (Ramallah:Turbo, 1999); The History of Jerusalem: New Trends in Research, co-edited with Salim Tamari, (Jerusalem: Institute of Jerusalem Studies, 2002); The Memoirs of Wasif Jawhariyyeh, 1904-1948 (a prominent Jerusalemite Musician), co-edited with Salim Tamari, (Beirut: Institute for Palestine Studies, in Arabic, 2002); Early Local Photography in Palestine:A Social and Visual History (London:A. M. Qattan Foundation, forthcoming, in Arabic, in 2003).

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Framing the Subversive in Post-War Beirut: Critical Considerations for a Social History of the Present Rasha Salti

In the past year, the debate over being the prevailing trend in art his- ‘the social history of art’, or the torical writing.Their marginalisation writing of the history of art within is not only the result of the conser- the practice of social history, has vative ideological sweep in Western once again been rekindled in the academia, but also the result of the pages of art and culture periodicals emergence of the ‘New Left’, post- in the United States.1 The latest structuralism, identity politics and instance was partly sparked by the postmodernism. At heart, the social appointment of Thomas Crow to history of art is founded on the the helm of the Getty Research interpretation of artistic and cultural Institute, and the consequent rise to production as an expression, mean- prominence and reach of the brand ing or sign, fundamentally – if not of scholarship he embodies at insti- totally – embedded in social struc- tutions, in parallel with academic tures or the forces born from the ones, that patron historians and crit- relations of production that struc- ics of art.The same debate flared in ture the society in which they 1999 with the publication of Crow’s emerge. In other words, class and The Intelligence of Art 2 and T. J. class relations are the key elements Clark’s Farewell to an Idea: Episodes in which the analysis is anchored from a History of Modernism 3. and where meaning is understood Both Crow and Clark are stellar to take shape. scholars in the field of the social his- This paper purports to sketch tory of art.T.J. Clark is now a the diagram that allows for thinking 1 Most notably Art Press,No.74, December 2001, and professor at Berkeley, while Crow or grounding a social history of Documents 21, Spring 2002 taught most recently at Yale artistic production in post-war

2 Crow,Thomas, The Intelligence University, prior to holding the Lebanon. Briefly.This has, by no of Art, Chapel Hill: University of directorship of the Getty Research means, been conceived as an aca- North Carolina Press, 1999. Institute. Despite the fact that these demic paper, nor is it the result of 3 Clark,T.J., Farewell to an Idea: two operate from the safe haven of serious, concerted research. Rather, Episodes from a History of tenure in prestigious institutions, it is more a conversation piece, an Modernism, New Haven & London:Yale University Press, their venture, which they share with invitation to venture into a territory 1999. a host of other scholars, is far from not quite familiar in the realm of art 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 79

history and art criticism in these counter-hegemonic) in this ‘count- confines. Although the syntax is er-current’ of artistic production. entirely in the affirmative, at heart – I would like to start with a few as I present it to you – it is meant prefatory remarks. I feel I ought to to be tuned to the interrogative. In ‘come clean’ before I venture into this instance, the paper will only investigating artistic works and their address artistic and cultural produc- authors in the framework I propose. tion that either has been identified, Not so much a pre-emptive move or has identified itself, as ‘alternative’, to curtail critical reactions, this ‘critical’,‘subversive’ and/or ‘counter- admission is more of an acknowl- current’. I realise that these attributes edgement of the shortfalls of the are loaded terms, and beg for deep- venture at the centre of this paper. er investigation and clarification. Prima facie, the bonds I carry – However, at this point in the intro- with pride – to the realm of the duction, and for the purposes of faces and projects I seek to analyse framing the subject of the paper, can be thought to undermine the they refer to artistic and cultural ‘objectivity’ of my venture. One of expression that has come to life the virtues – and charms – of the outside – and to some extent in social history or social critique of art spite – of official venues and institu- lies in that it evolves within a structions of culture, outside the social turalist diagram that gives realm and the ‘establishment’ of cul- considerable space to objectivity tural production and outside the without undermining the presence, conventional social practices of and power, of subjectivity. Unlike cultural consumption. Clark and,to a lesser degree, Crow, The paper is structured into who have written about the 18th, three sections.The first section 19th, and first half of the 20th cen- proposes to lay out relations of turies, dealing largely with artists who production and examine the recon- are deceased, the artists whose figuration of social classes in work I deal with are very much alive post-war Lebanon.The second and kicking.To complicate matters section maps the discursive matrix further, I am personally acquainted of hegemonic ideology.The third with almost all the members of the section hones in on the social and group, and some are extremely dear political realm in which this counter- to my heart.The larger social realm hegemonic, or alternative, current of in which they socialise, reap success artistic production, as well as its and failure, band and fall in dispute, authors and its patrons, lie.The final gossip, seek solace and experience section proposes to read a selection moments of recognition, is a world of these art works in light of the that was my home. At the risk of interpretive scheme unveiled by the digression, I will confess with a heavy two previous sections. It also seeks heart, that I have been homesick. In to examine how the attributes that respect, the extent to which my ‘modern’,‘kitsch’ and ‘subversive’ emotions may have tainted my nar- relate to these art works. Finally, in rative is only so far as to perfume it lieu of a conclusion, the paper will with tenderness. More to the point, I interrogate the ‘subversive’ (or am a subjective narrator wherein

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intimate, first hand and unconven- young to be considered eligible for tional knowledge informs the claims a historiography. However, my ven- of this paper. I am ‘privileged’ in ture is the stratagem I felt I access, since the group of artists and commanded, with the least ambiva- their works are so deeply shaped by lence, to break the silence of being ‘outside’, their archival traces critical evaluation and start a con- are uncollected, dispersed among versation. From an ideological the artists themselves, curators and standpoint, I wanted to be the dry, patron organisations. stern, old-fashioned structuralist, The second shortfall of this not to say leftist, to stand behind a paper is the result of my geograph- podium and bring class, as an eco- ical displacement. For the past nomic, political and social category three years, I have been migrating back into a conversation on culture between Beirut and New York and hegemony. City.Thus, my acquaintance with the quotidian of Beirut and the Diagram of Class Relations familiar access to the social realm There is wide disagreement in of this cultural production have Lebanon, and the rest of the world, been punctuated by sharp inter- as to the changing significance of ruptions. I have tried to keep up, to class distinctions, whether social the best of my capacity, but I classes exist at all, and whether it is acknowledge the negative impact still useful to read society in terms of that my absence has had on sharp- classes and class conflict. Both the ening and updating the data bank ‘New Left’ and the ‘New Right’ pres- of intimate, informal knowledge. ent us with a myriad of options. At However, this paper is partly a the risk of sounding like a crude, reflection born from displacement. dogmatic, old-fashioned Marxist, I More precisely, it is the coupling of defend the view that the analytical my recent acquaintance with fields perspective, provided by a class- in social science, such as cultural based perspective, is still the most studies, social history, sociology of pertinent. Indeed, the era of global culture and anthropology, with my ‘post-capitalism’ carries its own pecu- looking back at this counter-cur- liar categories of meaning and rent in Beirut.That is why I prefer engenders its own social and political to converse, rather than proclaim, phenomena; but, I find they are all and propose to sketch a frame- better understood when the under- work for a historiography, rather girding scheme is class-based. In the than narrate a history. case of Lebanon, and for the purpos- And, as a final reflection in this es of this paper, I propose a truly preface, I am aware that the ven- rough scheme of three classes.The ture of this paper can be regarded neo-liberal turn of the post-war era as preposterous, considering that a has sharpened polarisation between decade of interspersed, shy, experi- classes in ways that underscore the mental attempts at building a niche crude diagram I propose, but it has and practice of counter-hegemonic, also proletarianised social groups alternative artistic expression is within classes to the point of under- too embryonic, too fragile and too mining the scheme at the same time. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 81

I laboured, painstakingly, at finding warring factions signed the Taef the right balance between those Agreement, and as, at the same readers to whom the Lebanese con- time, George Bush père set his New text is the daily grind, and others to World Order well afoot to re-map whom Lebanon is something else – the United States’ emperium. whether a fellow Arab country or Lebanon figured in the more radical the vernacular version of Hong Kong geo-political restaging in the map- or Saigon. ping of the New World Order. It Historically, unlike some of its would no longer be the untamed Arab kin, Lebanon had prided itself – passage between Syria and with boisterous arrogance – on being Palestine, or the stage to petty war- a bastion of market-centred and lord and militias bickering over market-driven liberal economic poli- parceling fiefdoms. More important- cies. However, the neo-liberal outlook ly, it would no longer be the site of endorsed by successive post-war money-laundering, narcotics produc- governments, marked a decisive turn tion, trafficking and arms dealing. It in the country’s fate.While in Egypt, was not clear what shape and what Algeria, Iraq, Syria and Turkey, national direction the revival of Lebanon was governments of the mid-1950s and to take; however, it was premised on the 1960s embarked on state-led an irrevocable condition and circum- industrialisation and development scribed by an insurmountable with import-substitution, Lebanon’s obstacle.The diktat by the New successive national governments World Order stipulated that entrusted, principally, the private sec- Lebanon’s post-war security and tor with economic development and stability would be directly policed by production.To this day, the Lebanese Syria.The Syrian regime was offi- state has been, unwaveringly, the loyal, ciously vested with the mandate and fierce and proud defender of the powers to oversee the transition of well-being and prosperity of the Lebanon into a stable post-war con- ruling economic elite, its corporations dition, and to ward off the spectre and wealth, and its capacity at repro- of rekindling the civil conflict. On the ducing capital.The ‘social contract’ in other hand, the Lebanese revival Lebanon was, and still is, tipped sub- was circumscribed by having its stantially to the favour of employers southern tip remain the grounds for and private entrepreneurship. In Israeli occupation, or what the Israeli exchange for sharing the burden of state described as its ‘military security social wages with the state, tax bur- buffer zone’.This zone was also the dens were rendered significantly platform from which the only insignificant, and laws of banking remaining active armed resistance secrecy veiled accumulation of sur- was being waged against the Israeli plus from taxation.The boundaries state, outside the borders of the between the economic elite and the Occupied Territories and Gaza. political class have been, and remain, The first post-war government almost non-existent. was short-lived and dissolved in the The first stirrings of the civil clamour and rubble of massive, conflict erupted in Lebanon in 1973. countrywide, popular demonstra- It was brought to an end in 1991,as tions. Prevailing convention dates the

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first significant post-war government protagonists were grafted onto the to 1992, when the subsequent (or body of what is described as the second) cabinet, headed by the cur- ‘traditional’ economic and political rent Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri, leadership.These new protagonists who held, then, the post for the first were a collection of top cadres time, took office. His persona, more from political parties and move- so than the socio-political species he ments transformed into militias in emblematised, emerged as a phe- the last phase of the civil war.They nomenon and a force that spilled were political powerbrokers and into the fissured, hollowed war- warlords, who were included in the ravaged landscape of political forces round of negotiations that ended and their discourses. Rafiq al-Hariri, the war, and were endowed with along with his revolving cast of enough political clout to claim a cronies, experts, pundits and jingoists, stake in financial and business ven- has intermittently branded himself as tures in post-war Lebanon. In various incantations, reincarnations contrast, a fraction of the traditional and symbols of local political trends. component of the ruling class was, However, fundamentally, in terms of to some extent, marginalised. ideology and public policy, he was, ‘Traditional’, in post-war Lebanon, and remains, the business magnet came to mean many things. In this whose political charisma and ideolo- instance, it refers to the ruling gy champion neo-liberalism. ‘establishment’ in the pre-war era. Both the Taef Agreement and the More precisely, it refers to a social endorsement of the global sweep of group that has maintained its politi- the neo-liberal trend reshaped cal and economic hold on Lebanon’s post-war class structure. hegemonic standing over time, The wager of revival, or ‘reconstruc- through patrilineal legacy. In other tion’, by Hariri-led post-war words, the families/corporations governments was an alchemy of whose dominion or capital is either tight financial acrobatics to stabilise political or financial, and to whom the currency and a resounding global the discourse of ‘tradition’ provides advertising campaign proclaiming an uncontested legitimacy and Lebanon’s rise from the ashes, in an anchor in the timeline of the nation. effort to attract investment and bid There is a third component to the away economic revitalisation to hegemonic class that straddles private entrepreneurship.The gov- between Lebanon’s ‘traditional’ and ernment has been successful at parvenu groups; namely, the social stabilising the currency – albeit at a group of immigrant returnees, of backbreaking cost – yet less so at whom the Prime Minister Rafiq al- curbing inflation and ensuring equi- Hariri is the most recent and stellar table standards of living. scion. Some of the returning emi- grants, who were able to amass The Ruling Class considerable wealth, have repatriat- The reconfiguration of the ruling ed as powerful protagonists in the class was more the result of post- post-war period, and have become war political reshuffling than of heavyweight financiers and/or new economic or social policies. New political brokers. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 83

The Middle Class characteristics with a working class The reconfiguration of the – in its fledgling economic standing, Lebanese middle class has been in the dwindling package of social more the result of government securities it has access to and in its policy. In contrast to the hegemonic inability to bargain collectively with elite and the subaltern ‘working the private sector and the state – class’, or the ‘class of the poor’, the than it does with a middle class. middle class is the most widely- cited class, both in the government’s The Working Class rhetoric and in public policy, as the As for the working class, or the central pillar of the well-being, pros- ‘poor classes’, as they are often perity and advancement of the dubbed in the local vernacular, they nation. If the ruling class comprises remain the most mysterious and elu- large and secure holders of capital sive entity in the government’s (political and economic – and, in discourse.While at the outset of the Lebanon, the conversion value war, it stood as a significant organ- between both is quite straightfor- ised political force engaged in a ward), the middle class comprises protracted struggle to reverse the the salaried, white collar labour ideological foundations of the force (both in the private and pub- Republic, the Lebanese working class lic realms) that has a nominally has endured the most radical and secure access to social securities painful reconfiguration in the post- such as healthcare, education and war era. It still bears the wounds of retirement pensions.They also the civil war, some of which have include small-scale entrepreneurs barely healed.The class of ‘working and business owners, but not poor’ is a composite of a variety of their employees. socio-economic groups that are The state’s failure at curbing lumped into a single class because, in inflation and the rampant cost of the final analysis, they share an iden- living have taken their toll on the tical status of disenfranchisement, stability of the economic status of marginalisation, little or no access to the middle class.The neo-liberal social benefits such as healthcare, doxa’s sustained reductions of the education and retirement security. state’s role of safeguarding social These socio-economic groups benefits has further intensified the include unskilled, semi-skilled and precarity that threatens their status. skilled workers in the industrial and Salaried professionals, like physicians, service sectors, agricultural workers, lawyers, architects, engineers, teach- small-scale farmers and construction ers and such, have become workers, to name a few. proletarianised; their professional The post-war peace agreement associations, syndicates and unions laid the terrain for the massive have had little success in protecting import of unskilled, semi-skilled and their members from continued skilled labour from Syria that provid- assaults by the private sector and ed holders of capital, entrepreneurs by public policy. In conclusion, the and business owners with the sort of Lebanese middle class of the post- labour force they had only dreamed war era shares far more of. Historically, Lebanon’s prosperity

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and fragile status quo, in terms of middle class, albeit at different sub- class conflict, have been predicated levels within it, and some from the on the existence of a large pool of ruling class. None are formally unskilled and semi-skilled labour, out- employed as artists, and I could not side the realm of citizenship, bound answer how many, if any, belong to in extremely abusive relations of artists’ unions.These unions have power.This lowest-ranking group in done very little to secure social the social construct provides capital benefits for their membership.Their holders with a larger margin of the struggles have been more political, surplus, but it is also used to police particularly in the sense of marking the class of workers ranking just symbolic stances with regard to above them.Their complete political local political issues.The artists in and social marginalisation, and their question here are employed as exclusion from the ‘civil’ sphere, serve teachers, professors or journalists. to maintain standards of wage and As professionals, they are members work conditions at inhuman levels, of their respective syndicates and and to scale down standards for organisations. If they are able to sus- Lebanese workers. Moreover, Syrian tain a standard of living, they barely workers, although seemingly unor- make ends meet to ensure a secure ganised, are, in reality, bound by a living, and a single misfortune or variety of social networks of kin, vil- accident could threaten to seriously lage provenance and, ultimately, the disrupt their livelihood.Their artistic hierarchy of military and intelligence contributions take place outside officers that make up the Syrian task their working hours, and are, to a force in Lebanon. It is important to great extent, self-financed.Their note that Lebanese private entrepre- ‘social safety nets’ are mainly due to neurs have been more eager to their personal ties, restricted to the employ migrant, day-to-day workers precarious securities that their at extremely low wages and no immediate families provide. social costs, and to turn a deaf ear to the plight of Lebanese workers. In Discursive Matrix of effect, and on a final note on the Hegemonic Discourse subject, the working class, as such, has The case for Lebanon was differ- been completely absented and ent from that of its Arab kin because silenced in the post-war period.The the prevailing liberal ideology posited sectarian/communitarian discourse the middle class as the ‘national’ has reconfigured the Lebanese work- class.The period of the mid-1970s ing poor to fill the empty lower and early 1980s signaled a shift in bulges of the social constructions economic and social political out- that make up their respective sectari- look. Since then, Arab states have an communities.They are the marched steadily towards embrac- nameless, faceless soldiers and can- ing the global neo-liberal tidal wave, non fodder to whom undemocratic or what analysts define as the sectarian leaders pledge allegiance. ‘Washington Consensus’, propelling Where do my artists stand in the market as the unbridled central this diagram? They hail almost regulator of surplus value and social entirely from the flanks of the inequities.To quote Joel Beinin, 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 85

“The neo-liberal conception of an practices of identities follow suit. Our economy eliminates questions covenant shapes our society into about whose interests it serves. […] sectarian communities, where the Few advocates of the Washington interests of sectarian communities Consensus argue that an economy are believed to supersede those of should privilege the interests of social classes.The impact of the neo- local and multinational capital and liberal cast on the post-war cessation international financial institutions”4. of violence, policed by the Syrian Throughout the Arab world, the regime, has resulted in the almost working poor have been dissected complete hegemony of the sectari- in narrow and dry models of quan- an/communitarian discourse. All titative representations, between a political struggles that the Arab less belligerent ‘lower middle class’ world and the country find them- and ‘the poor’.The plethora of stud- selves at grips with, come to life ies and policy papers on poverty within the hegemonic framework of have shifted the paradigms of the sectarianism. In consequence, ques- debate from the vocabulary of a tions of social justice are ascribed class-based analysis in conjunction sectarian attributes, while the Arab- with aggressive marginalisation of Israeli conflict translates into conflict political parties that promote a amongst sects, and competing class-based outlook and unrelenting regional identities become subsumed isolation of the base of the working by overarching sectarian identities. poor from the higher ranks of its The most successful project of the union cadres and political leader- hegemonic class in the post-war ship. Class-based ideologies have period has been to essentialise and been rendered obsolete, deemed as institutionalise ethnographic con- anachronistic tools for building structions of sectarian difference and nation- and region-wide solidarities competing – almost irresolvable – and platforms for political actions. sectarian economic interests.While the middle class and class of working The Sectarian Discourse poor are fractured into sectarian The particularity of Lebanon has components, pitted against each more to do with the forms in which other in contest for a more equi- the hegemonic political and eco- table share of ‘entitlement’, in nomic class has attempted to steer practice, the ruling class has been a clear from confronting class-based stellar example of collaboration and ideologies and movements. It is a solidarity, overriding sectarian preju- strange hybrid of what the rest of dice for the accumulation of surplus the world has come to experience and the safeguarding of the repro- as identity-politics, cast in a clientelist, duction of wealth. patriarchal, communitarian, discursive representation of society. Contrary Political and Cultural Resistance to the US and Western Europe, A number of issues have pre- identity-politics in Lebanon take root vailed over the terrains of critical in firm constitutional, thus institution- contestation amongst the circles of 4 Beinin, Joel, Workers and Peasants in the Modern Middle al, ground, while the ethnographic post-war Lebanese intellectuals. East, New York: Cambridge cultural manifestations and social These include the questions of University Press, p. 147.

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Lebanon’s national identity, in light of the discursive frameworks initiated the stipulations of the Taef by Edward Said’s magisterial work Agreement versus the concrete on Orientalism and the ensuing aca- practices of the post-war ruling demic analyses proposed by the hegemony and the revitalisation, or Subaltern School and Postcolonial renewal, of the political class; the Studies. From there, debates over question of Lebanon’s sovereignty identity flow into the realm of stark under the weight of the Syrian man- polarisation and blithing disempow- date over-policing the transition to a erment that corsets constructions of stable post-war state; the question of the ‘West’ as opposed to construc- the Israeli occupation of the security tions of the ‘East’ and/or the ‘Third zone and the resistance to liberate World’ and/or developing nations. this territory; the question of the These debates reach the turbulent Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, their terrain of westernisation and civil status and political struggle; the modernity versus alternity and post- question of the neo-liberal assault on modernity, the rights of nations to public spending and on the state’s self-determination, to shape their provision of social safety nets and its own history and to reclaim their bidding away of rehabilitation and place in history.To many critical revitalisation to the private sector; intellectuals, Lebanon and the Arab the question of the legacy of the civil world remain ‘outside history’, to war, reconciliation and restoring the cite the famous Hegelian expression. demographic balance of pre-war The poles of these debates multi-sectarian regions and tending oppose the hegemonic, sectarian to the open wound of the families of pole with a centre-right, secular pole those kidnapped and missing during aligned with the surviving vestiges of the war. the left. Obviously, the balance of Almost all of the questions I have forces was, and remains, severely just listed intersect and spill onto biased, as is the access to resources, one another.The question of venues and exposure.When irked Lebanon’s identity and mosaic of or threatened, the ruling elite and its identities, overlaps the questions of Syrian junta does not hesitate to its sovereignty, the Syrian mandate, censure, coerce, intimidate and use the country’s imbrications in the force to silence criticism and break a struggle for Palestine, the Israeli mili- front of opposition.The cast of pro- tary occupation, its withdrawal and tagonists are the usual suspects of the negotiations for peace.The cultural circles and civil society: debates over identity are under-gird- Intellectuals, writers, journalists, edu- ed by debates on the new forms of cators, academics, artists, as well as American imperialism or the globali- prominent cadres and leadership of sation of an ideology, a mode of political parties at the margins or maximising exploitation and stream- outside the corridors of power. lining extraction of surplus, These debates have found niches in restructuring societies and com- their natural habitats:The press, cul- modifying civil and cultural practices. tural clubs and associations, some of The more intellectual and critical whom are independent and others debates over identity are moored in with partisan affiliations, and last but 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 87

not least, in cultural centres, per- practice. He dates the first manifesta- formance spaces and art galleries. tion to Ziad Abillama’s installation on Since the second post-war gov- the Dbayeh – then public – beach in ernment in 1992, a loosely-gelled the summer of 1992, entitled Systeme opposition front began to take form. Fulfill. Sadek did not intend to sketch It would grow and shrink intermit- a chronology, and neither do I. tently, depending on the particular Moreover, I am sure that this first campaign or struggle it had risen to marker will be subject to debate. My wage and the circumstances sur- intention is to track the evolution of rounding it.This front represented the organised effort to curate and less the fertile soil for a cogent polit- showcase these artistic practices. ical front, or for the renewal of Abillama acted entirely on his own; political life, and more the backdrop he conceived, produced, showcased to significant moments of confronta- and promoted his piece alone tion and contestation on issues (although not without the help and ranging from the preservation of support of friends, I understand). historical buildings to election fraud, Over the next few years, there were curtailing political freedoms, arbi- scattered instances where galleries trary abuse of force, etc… Its most and the cultural centres of foreign stable and steadfast core comprised missions became less apprehensive those surviving vestiges of the left. to the idea of hosting installations, However, a decade has lapsed; and, conceptual artworks and video art. unfortunately, the accumulation of Most notable among these were the campaigns and short-lived struggles cultural arm of the French Embassy have not fuelled a true revival of (which likes to describe itself as a political parties on the left. ‘cultural mission’) and the cultural In my introduction, I described arm of the German Embassy, the the counter-hegemonic cultural and Goethe Institute. By 1994, Ashkal artistic realm as lying in all its aspects Alwan was formed and began to outside the mainstream. More showcase venues where conceptual, specifically, this critical, oppositional, installation, unconventional and sub- contestatory front I have just out- versive artists produced pieces in lined is the social and political realm public places throughout the city. in which it lies. It is where its artists Curated by Christine Tohme, Ashkal work and produce, where their Alwan’s first event was staged in the curators showcase events and Sanayeh public garden in 1995. where the audience for these cultur- Shortly thereafter, the Ayloul Festival al practices is anchored. became a venue marking the first few days of September in Beirut. If Alternative, Counter-hegemonic more venues, galleries and exhibition Cultural and Artistic Practices spaces have since then sprouted, In a short and delightful piece these two protagonists remain the published in Mulhaq an-Nahar, or the only ones that curate events.To the cultural supplement to the daily limit of their capacities, they offer the An-Nahar last year,Walid Sadek framework of an institutional prac- proposed a rudimentary path to a tice and not just haphazard chronology of this family of artistic occurrence. Christine Tohme attests

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to the fact that one of her long Unfortunately, this audience has, for standing ambitions is to endow most of the time, remained frozen Ashkal Alwan with a resource in its misapprehension of the unfa- archive and lay the solid foundations miliar and the obscure. On the for the organisation's longevity. other hand, the technicity and the Both Ayloul and Ashkal Alwan’s craftsmanship invested in creating projects have been financed by such works, the cold estrangement grants from international founda- from conventional language, its defi- tions, local corporate sponsorship ant contemporaneity and seemingly and occasional grants from the unprejudiced borrowing of form Ministry of Culture in Lebanon.Their and vocabulary from post-industrial livelihood rests solely on such grants cultures, has rendered the percep- that, in themselves, represent one of tion and judgment of conceptual the greater dangers to their survival. art and its kin forms as imported The extent to which such grants are ‘postmodern’ forms, unfit for dispensed with limitations or direc- expression within Lebanese society. tives is pivotal to uncovering more of In this vein, the very shape a con- the under-girding politics in which ceptual or installation piece takes artistic production is framed or becomes laden with pointless inter- circumscribed. At this instance, in this rogations on the authenticity of paper, it remains an open question. expression and representation and, ultimately, on identity. Besides hol- Locating the Subversive and the low questioning of ‘authenticity’, the Counter-Hegemonic problem of legibility lingers The Modernity/Postmodernity nonetheless, and illicits the ques- Debacle tion, with whom do these artists The number of prevailing issues communicate? To what extent do and debates I listed earlier has also they wish to mediate to an audi- unraveled in the realms of counter- ence and, is there significance to hegemonic and alternative, artistic their incommunicability? expression and representation. On the question of authenticity, They have done so in the vocabu- representation and identity, I would lary of conceptual, installation, video like to propose shifting the terms and performance art.To some of the debate to the following con- extent, the use of this contempo- text. If we were to take T.J. Clark’s rary, yet alien, language has claim of money being “the root engendered more debate and conform of representation in bour- troversy than the artists intended, geois society” to be valid, what expected or wished to grapple happens to our questions when with. On the one hand, this lan- resituated in the framework of the guage begs an entirely different dual currency that shapes our experience of deciphering and economy and our society? understanding from established Moreover, how does it impact the convention, from an audience with notion of sovereignty, the bound- few resources for an unencum- aries of the ‘national’ and those bered experience with artistic elements widely perceived as expression and practice. threatening both sovereignty and 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 89

the nation? I leave this point in that self-positing comes to an interrogation form. end”.T.J. Clark describes that Incommunicability is partly the moment as such: predicament of modernist artistic expression, or of artistic expression Once democratisation of manners and inscribed in modernism.T.J. Clark’s disinhibition of mores have really done their work on modernism has been par- work of symbolic pseudo-levelling, once a ticularly inspiring. In the general encanaillement of the possessing introduction to Farewell to an Idea, classes has overtaken the older, embarrass- he writes: ing, Bourdieu-type signs of distinction, the game for modernism is up. It has no adver- Modernism had two great wishes. It sary. Its endless rifts and deformations of the wanted its audience to be led towards a aristocratic legacy – the very legacy the recognition of the social reality of the sign bourgeoisie was struggling at the same time (away from the comforts of narrative and to turn to its own purposes – came to mean illusionism, was the claim); but equally it nothing, to have less and less critical force, dreamed of turning the sign back to a because the bourgeoisie had abandoned the bedrock of World/Nature/Sensation/ struggle, and finally settled (as it always Subjectivity, which the to and fro of wanted to) for purely instrumental reason.6 capitalism had all but destroyed.5 Both T.J. Clark and Anderson The incommunicability is, at agree that a crucial marker of dif- once, the proposal for new forms ference between modernism and of expression and production of postmodernism is that, while the symbol, with its open-ended inter- former is shaped by “an open polit- rogations of itself laid bare, all the ical horizon, in which revolutionary while bound within the hegemonic upheavals of one kind or another production of meaning and symbol. against the prevailing order were Frederic Jameson proposed that, widely expected or feared”, the lat- since modernism was the cultural ter is shaped by “the cancellation of expression of capitalism, then post- political alternatives”. In other modernism would be the cultural words, it is “the end of a long expression of post-capitalism. Perry epoch of revolutionary myths and Anderson proposed a variant to challenges to bourgeois society on this formulation. In The Origins of which modernism had fed”. Postmodernism, he contends that To what extent are the artists in modernism is “the product of a question imbricated in the modernist bourgeois society in which the and postmodernist predicament? bourgeoisie still struggled for cul- To what extent does the matrix of tural self-definition in the face of its the social class conflict that feudal, aristocratic other; one in describes the European 19th and which the sheer extremity of that 20th centuries resemble our own; struggle for self-definition forced and, are comparisons at all useful?

the bourgeoisie to declare itself as There are tremendous divergences 5 Clark,T. J., Farewell to an Idea,p.10. a specific locus of that cultural between the class structures and 6 Clark,T. J., Origins of the Present authority”. “Postmodernism manifestations of capitalism both Crisis, New Left Review, March- comes”, he writes further,“when in the 19th and 20th centuries of April, 2000.

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Europe and our present and past In terms of themes and subject conjectures. However, the matrix matter, artists like Walid Sadek, of conflict between classes over Akram Zaatari,Walid Raad, Salah power or hegemony unveils a Saouli, Marwan Rechmaoui, Nadine scheme which can be useful to Touma, Lamia Joreige, Jalal Toufic, understand our own. Tony Chakar, Rabih Mroué, Lina Saneh and others, have often gravi- Bringing Back Class tated towards problematic, Prima facie, the most delightful conflictual and contested nodal feature of these artistic practices lies points in the hegemonic discourse. in that they can rarely be ‘wrapped To cite a few, they have interrogated to go’ for the purpose of matching a representations and constructions of sofa and brightening a wall. In fact, moral taboos at the heart of the these artworks, except for video art, bourgeois understanding of decency behave more like apparitions.They and morality like sexuality, homosex- come to life in the most familiar of uality and constructions of gender, public sites for short brackets of objectification of the body and of time and disappear forever. prostitution; they have interrogated Moreover, they leave scant traces – representations and reconstructions a picture or a diagram and a text in of the prevailing script on the civil a brochure; occasionally, traces in the war (in as far as there is one), the press. By virtue of all these virtues, historiography of the civil war and they are unburdened by accusations the intimate vocabulary of sectarian with regard to the commodification identities; they have interrogated of the consumption of art as a intellectual censorship (and also social practice to celebrate class sta- confronted it); they have interrogat- tus; or, the reification of ‘habitus’. ed constructions of the Israeli Most, if not all, of Ashkal Alwan proj- occupation, the boundaries of resist- ects have taken place in open public ance, violence, and construction of spaces, where tangible obstacles bar- heroism and treason and the criteria ring access to the site are nominally for inclusion/exclusion from the eliminated. Furthermore, brochures nation… And I am only scratching at distributed, free of charge, as infor- the surface… mational support to events, facilitate The contention that I wish to mediation between the viewer and defend, in this last instance, and that the artwork.The audience of these probably explains why I had my artistic practices comprises, in the readers endure the long socio-eco- first place, its practitioners and a nomic exposé, lies in rethinking the nebula of kin audience, to whom cultural expression of social classes, the industry of artistic and cultural as I laid them out in the first section, production has become an essential in light of the brief quotes from T.J. component of social and political Clark and Perry Anderson. Namely, I identity – an identity that defines started from the proposition that itself also in contrast to hegemonic our bourgeoisie, or middle class, is construction, but is unclear about by all means a working class. the standing and significance of the Meanwhile, our ruling class behaves counter-hegemonic. very much like a bourgeoisie that 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 91

has won access to higher standing; absent; however, when it occurs, it and yet, it is a class whose political stops at representation. It does not and cultural sovereignty are deeply bring with it an interrogation of the compromised, beholden to actors, fabric of class conflict that shapes entities and institutions outside of its that reality. My argument is that sub- command. If it is able to assert a version, in the Lebanese context, lies hegemonic dominion over the social principally in interrogating the frac- classes below it, it is deeply compro- tures, nodes, meanings and signs of mised by waging continuous the hegemonic discourse from a struggles to maintain that dominion class-based perspective. and the discourse to legitimise it. In this respect, it labours at asserting Conclusion cultural and political authority as if it I wish to conclude with a brief were the bourgeoisie.While the illustration. For this purpose, I will group of counter-hegemonic artists use Akram Zaatari’s video piece, who hail from the margins of the Red Chewing Gum, because I know nominal bourgeoisie, and operate that I can abuse his friendship.The from within it, may have a vested piece was presented in the Hamra interest in deconstructing the hege- Street Project, also an endeavour by monic dominion and discourse of Ashkal Alwan.The video narrates the ruling class, their identification the remembrance of a love story, with modernity and/or postmoder- or more precisely, the end of a love nity inscribes them to a silent story.The narrative is built on three struggle of asserting the cultural protagonists, two men and a chew- authority of their class. Moreover, ing gum peddler.The dialogue, or their practical, quotidian experience story, shifts intermittently between stands in deep contradiction to this the two men as they recall an venture. Every day, at every instance instance of their love affair, while and with every transaction, they are walking down Hamra Street and reminded of their subalternity and encountering a young chewing gum of the precarity of their status.Their peddler.The love affair is, in fact, social standing may carry the varnish mediated between them through of the comforts of the bourgeoisie, the chewing gum peddler. He is but their practical experience representative of that subaltern informs them otherwise. In other population of Hamra Street; of words, these artists’ gazes have been invisible, faceless, nameless, ped- stubbornly turned upwards more dlers, beggars and toilers who often than downwards.Their stark anchor the experience of urban spurning of a class-based sensibility, consumption with an incremental of a class-based overall understand- value.The army of street fauna, ing of the nodal points on which the interpellating benevolence, selling hegemonic discourse is built, mud- shoe-shines or amusing knick- dles the counter-hegemonic terrain knacks, coupled with the codes of on which they stand. I do not mean dress, self-presentation and behav- to say that representation of subal- iour of salespeople in the shops tern classes, the working poor, represent the subaltern, the organ- peddlers, prostitutes, servants, etc., is ised world of the ‘domestic stable’,

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whose labour is to cater to the shock or provocation to hegemonic well-being of the discriminating (‘bourgeois’) notions of decency, consumers of Hamra street. I order and well-being. In the thought it both powerful and inter- absence of a class-based critique, esting that a chewing gum peddler such instances become pure kitsch. be the principal mediator of a story They serve the opposite purpose of an insouciant romance on of subversion, and reinforce the Hamra Street. Zaatari used him as hegemonic class’ self-righteous a symbol to represent the polarity dominion over its capacity at in power relations between two renewal and co-optation.This very people caught in a love affair. In capacity is that which lies at the other words, the class status of the heart of capitalism’s cultural immu- chewing gum peddler was what nity against attacks and critiques, mattered to Zaatari, not the refer- grounded exclusively in ‘morality’ ence to the brutality on which and ‘decency’. representations of urban joie de The fantastic, and perhaps tragic, vivre rests, or the significance of his contradiction in which these artists status in the larger landscape of and their works are caught, is that, class relations. I am not making a by engaging in the illusory promise judgment on what ought and what of a power struggle to claim cultur- ought not to be, what is right and al authority for the class they what is wrong. My intention is to presume is their own, they become demonstrate via this example, albeit engaged in silencing the class they in a cursory manner, how the effectively belong to. counter-hegemonic posturing of this artistic expression falls short of engaging in subversion because it disregards a class-based perspective.This said, the video piece has a life of its own outside the intentions of its author. And to some extent, I read into the use of the chewing gum peddler a sign that revealed relations of production and class relations that Zaatari may have not intended.The overall piece does not, however, pick up on that sign enough to inform my reading further. Red Chewing Gum is one example where the subaltern is represented.There are other instances, which I will not discuss now, where symbols, elements of practices or referents to the quotidian of the subaltern classes are completely appropriated and reproduced for the purposes of 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 93

Rasha Salti was born in Toronto, Canada in 1969, and currently resides between Beirut and New York.She obtained a BA in Fine Arts from Georgetown University in 1992, and an MA in Liberal Studies from the New School for Social Research in 2000. Her work experience includes working as an intern at Alif Gallery,Washington D.C., from 1991-1992, and also as part of the adminis- trative team at Theatre de Beyrouth, from 1992-1994. Since 1995, she has worked as a graphic designer, as well as an independent cultural events organiser.Among her significant projects was Image Quest, co-curated and organised along with Moukhtar Kocache in 1995. She worked at L’Orient-Express and L’Agenda Culturel as art director and designer. She also assisted in the 50th Commemoration of the Nakba of Palestine, held at Theatre de Beyrouth.

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‘Ashura’, or Torturous Memory as a Condition of Possibility of an Unconditional Promise

Jalal Toufic

Can one still give and maintain To breed an animal with the right to millenarian promises in the twenty make promises—is not this the paradoxical first century? But first, a more task that nature has set itself in the case of basic question: can one still man? is it not the real problem regarding man? promise at all? That this problem has been solved to a Al-Husayn, the grandson of the large extent must seem all the more remark- prophet Muhammad and the son able to anyone who appreciates the strength of the first Shi‘ite imam, ‘Ali b. Abi of the opposing force, that of forgetfulness. Talib, was slaughtered alongside Forgetting is no mere vis inertiae as the many members of his family in the superficial imagine; it is rather an active and desert in 680.This memory is tor- in the strictest sense positive faculty of ture to me. But, basically, one can repression…1 say this memory is torture to me of Now this animal which needs to be forget- every memory, since each reminis- ful, in which forgetting represents a force, a cence envelops at some level the form of robust health, has bred in itself an memory of the origin of memory, opposing faculty, a memory, with the aid of the torture that had to be inflicted which forgetfulness is abrogated in certain on humans in order for them to cases—namely in those cases where promises 1 Cf.“Freud does not consider this amnesia [infantile amnesia] be able to remember. If we feel a are made… to be the result of any functional tinge of pain, a pang, when we “How can one create a memory for the inability of the young child to remember it is not necessarily human animal? How can one impress some- record his impressions; instead, he attributes it to the repression because the past vanishes, is no thing upon this partly obtuse, partly flighty which falls upon infantile sexuali- more (Einstein’s relativity and mind, attuned only to the passing moment, in ty (…). Just like hysterical Dogen’s Zen tell us otherwise in such a way that it will stay there?” amnesia, infantile amnesia can in principle be dispelled; it does two different ways), but because One can well believe that the answers not imply any destruction or each memory reactivates in us and methods for solving this primeval problem absence of registrations of however faintly the genealogy of were not precisely gentle; perhaps indeed there memories…” (J. Laplanche and J.-B. Pontalis, The language of the establishment of memory. In was nothing more fearful and uncanny in the Psycho-analysis, trans. Donald Duodeciman Shi‘ites’ yearly ten- whole prehistory of man than his Nicholson-Smith, with an intro- day commemoration ‘Ashura’, we mnemotechnics.“If something is to stay in duction by Daniel Lagache [New York: Norton, 1973], pp. witness a condition of possibility of memory it must be burned in: only that which 2 212-213). memory, in a Nietzschian sense: never ceases to hurt stays in the memory” — 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 95

this is a main clause of the oldest (unhappily also the most enduring) psychology on earth.3 One might even say that wherever on earth solemnity, seriousness, mystery, and gloomy colouring still distinguish the life of man and a people, something of the terror that formerly attended all promises, pledges and vows on earth is still effective… Man could never do without blood, torture, and sacrifices when he felt the need to create a memory for himself; the most dreadful sacrifices and pledges (sacrifices of the first-born among them),4 the most repulsive mutilations (castration, for example),5 the cruelest rites of all the religious cults (and all religions are at the deepest level systems of cruelties)—all this has its origin in the instinct that realised that pain is the most powerful aid to mnemonics. If we place ourselves at the end of this

tremendous process, where the tree at last 2 Among other factors, we can call the long primeval period the “prehistory of brings forth fruit, where society and the morali- man” for the following two complementary reasons.The first is that he had a ty of custom at last reveal what they have flighty mind and was attuned only to the passing moment, and so was unable to produce the deep temporality of past/present/future required to construct simply been the means to, then we discover a history.The second reason is that most of the torture to inculcate in him a that the ripest fruit is the sovereign individual, memory, i.e. the most atrocious and frequent torture, was happening then, like only to himself, liberated again from morali- with the result that that period, the most traumatic of all, was and still is repressed, and consequently is not included in our history—it is as it were ty of customs, autonomous and supramoral humanity’s infantile amnesia. (for “autonomous” and “moral” are mutually 3 Nietzsche’s words apply far better to the distant past, for man could then exclusive), in short, the man who has his own withstand much more pain because he was much more superficial, whereas independent, protracted will and the right to now, having to a large extent succeeded in creating a memory for himself and make promises… And just as he is bound to therefore being (temporally) far deeper, with few exceptions intense pain easily and quickly traumatises him, ushering repression and consequently honour his peers, the strong and reliable (those post-traumatic amnesia. with the right to make promises)—that is, all 4 A long-term memory of the addressee of the promise is a precondition even those who promise like sovereigns, reluctantly, for the promiser.Thus one of the conditions for God’s promise to Abraham is rarely, slowly, who are chary of trusting, whose that the latter create a memory for himself:“Then God said,‘Take your son, trust is a mark of distinction, who give their your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.’ word as something that can be relied on (…) The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time and because they know themselves strong enough said,‘I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and to maintain it in the face of accidents, even “in have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the the face of fate”—he is bound to reserve… a seashore.Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, rod for the liar who breaks his word even at and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed…’” (Genesis 22: 2-18 the moment he utters it. ). … Ah, reason, seriousness, mastery over 5 Clearly castration is here theorised from a different perspective than the one the affects, the whole sombre thing called encountered in most feminist film criticism drawing on psychoanalysis (see Laura Mulvey’s “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”). reflection, all these prerogatives and show- pieces of man: how dearly they have been 6 Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals, trans.Walter Kaufmann and R.J. Hollingdale/Ecce Homo, trans.Walter Kaufmann; edited, with commentary, by bought! How much blood and cruelty lie at the Walter Kaufmann (New York:Vintage Books, 1989), pp. 57-62. I rearranged the bottom of all “good things”! 6 order of one of the quote’s paragraphs.

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The preservation of the events of ‘Ashura’ takes place at two levels: in alam al-mithal (The World of Images), aka alam al-khayal (The World of the Imagination),7 where they are, in a transfigured version, eternal, outside 7 More specifically in al-khayal al-munfasil. Ibn al-‘Arabi “calls the intermediate both the corrosive, dimming sway of world of imagination ‘discontiguous imagination’ (al-khayal al-munfasil), since it chronological time, and the exists independently of the viewer. And he names the soul along with the faculty of imagination ‘contiguous imagination’ (al-khayal al-muttasil), since these labyrinthine temporality of the realm are connected to the viewing subject.” (William C. Chittick, The Sufi Path of of undeath, where al-Husayn would Knowledge: Ibn al-‘Arabi’s Metaphysics of Imagination [Albany, N.Y.: State run the risk of forgetting who he is, University of New York Press, 1989],p.117).The notion of khayal munfasil, of an imagination independent of the viewer, which we find not only in the Sufism of forgetting himself; and in historical of Ibn al-‘Arabi but also in Shi‘ite theosophy, will regain currency with the time, through the bodily and emo- advances in and spread of virtual reality; in Andy and Larry Wachowski’s tional tortures endured during the Gnostic film The Matrix, 1999, the vast simulation called the Matrix is an example of khayal munfasil, while what each of those within the Matrix, i.e. within yearly ten-day commemorative cere- 8 the khayal munfasil, subjectively imagines is a khayal muttasil. mony, which are the means to breed 9 8 Many of those present at the assemblies of ‘Ashura’ cover their faces with in the human being, a forgetful crea- their hands.When they remove their hands one often can see that they were ture (“And verily We made a crying. But sometimes, one suddenly espies through a gap between their fin- covenant of old with Adam, but he gers that they are yawning! In part these yawns are not the effect of boredom at hearing yet again the same stories of the tragedy, but of sleepiness, as these forgot, and We found no constancy assemblies take place from around 9 p.m. till around midnight.This yawn has in him” [Qur’an 20: 115]), a historical the same unsettling effect as the small spot of corruption in the otherwise memory. But the memory that the uncorrupted corpse of a saint:“Ruysbroeck has been buried for five years; he is exhumed; his body is intact and pure (of course—otherwise, there would ceremony of ‘Ashura’ is trying to be no story); but ‘there was only the tip of the nose which bore a faint but maintain is not only or mainly that certain trace of corruption.’ In the other’s perfect and embalmed figure (for of the past, but the memory of the that is the degree to which it fascinates me) I perceive suddenly a speck of corruption.This speck is a tiny one: a gesture, a word, an object, a garment, future, that of the promise of the something unexpected which appears (which dawns) from a region I had coming of the Mahdi, the Shi‘ite never even suspected, and suddenly attaches the loved object to a common- messiah, as well as the correspon- place world…. I am flabbergasted: I hear a counter-rhythm: something like a syncope in the lovely phrase of the loved being, the noise of a rip in the ding promise of Duodeciman smooth envelope of the Image” (“The Tip of the Nose,” in Roland Barthes, A Shi‘ites to wait for him.The exem- Lover’s Discourse: Fragments, trans. Richard Howard [New York: Hill and Wang, plary promise has until now been 1978], p. 25).The sleepiness affecting these yawning participants is of the kind that affected the three disciples Jesus Christ selected to accompany him for the messianic one, for at least three prayer. He asked them:“Stay here and watch with Me” (Matthew 26: 38). He reasons. It has been the longest last- moved a stone’s throw (Luke 22: 41—how incisive is the laconism of this a ing, spanning centuries, even stone’s throw) and prayed. Returning to them, he found the three sleeping: “What? Could you not watch with Me one hour?” (Matthew 26: 40).Three millennia. It has been maintained “in times does he leave them to pray, each time, upon returning, finding them the face of accidents, even ‘in the sleeping.“Are you still sleeping and resting? Behold, the hour is at hand, and face of fate’”: Duodeciman Shi‘ites the Son of Man is being betrayed…” (Matthew 26: 45). have maintained the promise to 9 “Respecting the derivation of insan [a human being], authors differ (…): the wait for the successor of al-Hasan Basrees say that it is from al-ins [sociability], and its measure is fi‘lan; (…) some say that it is from inas, signifiying ‘perception,’ or ‘sight,’ and ‘knowledge,’ and al-‘Askari, the eleventh imam, who ‘sensation’ (…) and Mohammad Ibn-‘Arafeh El-Wasitee says that men are died in 260 AH / 873-74 AD, even called insiyyun because they are seen (yu’nasun, i.e. yurawn) and that the jinn though the latter apparently left no are called jinn because they are [ordinarily] concealed (mujtannun, i.e. mutawarun), from the sight of men (…) some (namely, the Koofees, Msb) say son, and even though the occulta- that it is originally insiyan (S, Msb,TA,) of the measure if‘ilan, from an-nisyan tion of the presumed twelfth imam [“forgetfulness”], (Msb), and contracted to make it more easy of pronuncia- has by now persisted for over a mil- tion, because of its being so often used.”The entry alif nun sin in Edward William Lane, An Arabic-English Lexicon, 8 vol. (Beirut, Lebanon: Librairie du lennium; and they have maintained Liban, 1980). their expectation that the twelfth 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 99

imam will fulfil his promise to me, his initiate, to be resurrected appear again. And, third, it implicates into a lawless world.13 The ceremo- a supramoral, antinomian attitude, ny of ‘Ashura’ is the flip side of the hence Sabbatai Sevi’s “strange belief in the promise of the hidden actions,” which included causing ten imam. I would thus wager that the Israelites to eat “fat of the kidney” in introduction of the ceremonies of 10 The Great Resurrection of Alamût lasted till 1210. 1658, an act which is strictly prohib- ‘Ashura’ and of Ta‘ziya coincided with ited by the Torah, and punishable by a period when Duodeciman Shi‘ism 11 Friedrich Nietzsche:“I beware of speaking of chemical ‘laws’: “excision” (getting cut off from was not on the rise but, on the con- that savours of morality.” The among one’s people); reciting the trary, when the continued belief in Will to Power, trans.Walter following benediction over the ritu- the coming of a Mahdi was in dan- Kaufmann and R.J. Hollingdale (New York: Random House, ally forbidden fat:“Blessed are Thou, ger of extinction. From this 1968), p. 630. O Lord, who permittest that which perspective, the condemnation of 12 Abdulaziz Abdulhussein is forbidden”; and abolishing the fast these ceremonies by many Sachedina, Islamic Messianism: the of the Seventeenth of Tammuz in Duodeciman Shi‘ite ‘ulama’14 is short- Idea of Mahdi in Twelver Shi‘ism 1665; hence also the Qarmatis’ sack- sighted.Were ‘Ashura’ to be (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1981), p. 158. ing and desecration of the Ka‘ba in discontinued across the Duodeciman 930 and then their abolishing of the Shi‘ite community, then sooner or 13 I find this period so unjust that it seems to me there are, Shari‘a during the Zakariyya al- later the memory of the promise of beside the revolutionary one, Isfahani episode in Ahsa’; and hence the occulted imam would fade away. two exemplary responses to it: the Nizaris’ abolishing of the Shari‘a The basic reason the ceremony’s a messianic one and a Gnostic one.The first demands waiting starting with the proclamation by participants hit themselves and self- for the messiah (“which is the Hasan ‘ala dhikrihi’l-salam (on his flagellate15 is not some unreasonable best of actions during his mention be peace) of the Great feeling of guilt for not succoring occultation”), who will in the 8 end fill with justice a world Resurrection in Alamut in August imam Husayn and his family around only transiently filled with injus- 1164 from a pulpit facing west, a 1300 years ago, but that such cruelty tice since it is essentially and direction opposite to the Ka‘ba in is a most efficient mnemonic. Some ultimately good, being created by God, the good God.The Mecca, the direction toward which may object that the morality of second demands the disinvest- all Moslems have to turn during mores, etc., has already born fruit, ment from this demonic world, their prayer.10 The basic and ultimate namely the one who can promise which has nothing to do with the good God, but was created promise is to wait for the messiah, on the basis of his ability to remem- by a demiurge. who, truly sovereign, supramoral, ber, and that therefore there is no 14 For example Muhsin al-Amin: will initially break the Law, including longer any need for such a cruel see Thawrat al-tanzih: Risalat al- the “laws” of nature11 (indeed his mnemonic.This would be the case tanzih, taliha mawaqif minha miraculous coming notwithstanding for promises of normal spans (but wa-ara’fi al-Sayyid Muhsin al- 16 Amin, ed. Muhammad al-Qasim his death or millennial occultation is not for one that spans millennia), al-Husayni al-Najafi (Bayrut: often announced by supernatural and were we not reaching a point Dar al-Jadid, 1996).

events “such as the rise of the sun where the immemorial process, 15 Many a flagellant’s slap against his from the west, and the occurrence described by Nietzsche, by which chest is as sober as the flapping of the solar and lunar eclipses in the man succeeded to a large extent to of a bird’s wing during flight. middle and the end of the month create a memory for himself is 16 While we should be willing to of Ramadan, respectively, against the beginning to be reversed. Paul Virilio, pay the price for the ability to give promises, and therefore for natural order of such the thinker of dromology, writes:“The the memory that is a precondi- phenomena”12 ), then altogether acceleration of real time, the limit- tion for promises, should we abolish the Law, which applies only acceleration of the speed of light, not make sure that promises do not span centuries or millennia, given to the unredeemed world, estab- only dispels geophysical extension… that the price of such promises lishing redemption, thus allowing but, first and foremost, it dispels the is exorbitant?

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importance of the longues durées of hours of TV per week, and teenagers the local time of regions, countries watch about 22 hours per week),18 and the old, deeply territorialised to hear and see a live “event” any- nations… Past, present and future— where in the world of globalisation

17 Paul Virilio, The Information Bomb, that tripartite division of the time only to instantly forget about it: trans. Chris Turner (London: continuum—then cedes primacy to Rwanda, then a commercial for a Verso, 2000), pp. 118-119. the immediacy of a tele-presence… soap brand, then sports… In order 18 1992 figures; they were 28 This is… the time of light and its to describe the human being at the hours per week and 23.5 hours speed—a cosmological constant capa- beginning of the twenty first century per week, respectively, in 1986 17 (1986 Nielsen Report on ble of conditioning human history.” in front of his TV, we can instead of Television).According to the We started with a flighty mind resorting to Virilio’s contemporary Centre for Media Education in attuned only to the passing moment; terms revert to the terms Nietzsche Washington, DC, watching TV is the nº 1 after-school activity then we had a torturous process of was using to describe man in prehis- for 6 to 17 year olds; each year thousands of years of pain and sacri- tory:“partly obtuse, partly most children spend about fices to inculcate in humans a flighty-mind, attuned only to the 1500 hours in front of the TV and 900 hours in the class- memory, and consequently a deep passing moment.”We (or more pre- room; and by age 70, most time; but we have now reached cisely the West) will more and more people will have spent about someone who is being conditioned be able to accurately predict through 10 years watching TV. and programmed by telecommuni- computer simulation,19 but we (or 19 Indeed live prematurely in the cations at the speed of light, for more precisely the West) will less future through virtual reality using the simulations of example TV (on average in the USA, and less be able to give promises. extremely powerful computers. children aged 2 to 11 watch about 23

Jalal Toufic is a writer, film theorist, and video artist. He is the author of Distracted (1991;2nd ed. forthcoming, 2003), (Vampires):An Uneasy Essay on the Undead in Film (1993;2nd ed. forthcoming, 2003), Over-Sensitivity (1996), Forthcoming (2000), and Undying Love, or Love Dies (2002). His video and installation works, which include Credits Included:A Video in Red and Green (1995), Radical Closure Artist with Bandaged Sense Organ (1997), Overlooking the Unsightly to See (2000), The Sleep of Reason:This Blood Spilled in My Veins (2002), and ‘Ashura’:This Blood Spilled in My Veins (2002), and Sacing Face (2003) have been presented in New York (Artists Space); San Francisco (the San Francisco Cinematheque, the Lab and Yerba Buena Centre for the Arts); Berkeley (Pacific Film Archive); Los Angeles (UCLA Film and TV Archive); Barcelona (Fundació Antoni Tàpies);Rotterdam (Witte de With);Brussels (Palais des Beaux-Arts); Berlin (BüroFriedrich);Toronto (YYZ Artists’ Outlet); Marseille (centre international de poésie);Athens (the National Museum of Contemporary Art); Cairo (Townhouse Gallery); and Beirut. He is a member of the Arab Image Foundation. He co-edited the special Discourse issue Gilles Deleuze:A Reason to Believe in this World, and edited the special Discourse issues Middle Eastern Films Before Thy Gaze Returns to Thee and the forthcoming Mortals to Death.Toufic has taught at the University of California at Berkeley, California Institute of the Arts, USC, and DasArts (Amsterdam), and is currently the Head of the MA program in Film/Video Studies at Holy Spirit University, Lebanon. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 101

23 March 2002 Jalal Toufic, Beirut [email protected]

Betty, Paris: As for the book you volun- teered to give me as a gift and promised to send to me, Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, one of the lines in the first edition of my first book, Distracted, says:“My apology turned out to be unnecessary, for he had already forgiven my age”: isn’t youth the age when one gives so many promises—including to oneself—that remain unfulfilled—at least for a long time. Promising is one of those actions that seem to be the easiest—after all, it is a per- formative (see J.L. Austin’s How to Do Things with Words)—when actually it is the most difficult since unnatural:“To breed an animal with the right to make promises—is not this the paradoxical task that nature has set itself in the case of man?” (Nietzsche).

Best Jalal

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The Singular of Seeing [Al Marra min Nazar]

Akram Zaatari

My friends are aware of my production of the period, or the close relationship with the popular craft and technicity then, may fail to Egyptian films of the 1940s and grasp some of the cultural links that 1950s. I perceive them as a rich strengthen the reading of his work, archive, rarely ‘read’, despite their in harmony with his original inten- being regularly broadcast on most tions and within his mode of Arab television channels.They have production2.The study of this con- been so over-watched that they text often helps to identify narrative have become a mere background patterns and possible deviations to our domestic life.We sing songs from those patterns, which sheds from musicals and memorise lines light on the practice itself in relation from films, using them in our daily to given socio-economic and language. However, we rarely go political contexts. beyond the storyline to question or One usually finds photographs study their narrative content or separated from their correspon- structure.While researching the his- ding narratives, whereas films – tory of photography in the region1,I whether to an advantage or disad- have become increasingly attentive vantage – carry their narratives to the fact that these popular films within them, often in packaged, are inseparable from a larger visual edited formats such as feature or culture, which includes photography, short films, documentaries or print and fashion.The photographic reports. When separation between

1 Referring to my ongoing work of Armenian-Egyptian photog- image and narrative occurs, the research for the Arab Image rapher Van Leo (1922-2002),for narrative, or illustrative information, Foundation conducted in example, had a fundamental con- in a certain fragment is reduced to Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt, exhibited and published nection to fashion, acting, the local the strictest minimum observed in on several occasions. (Please film industry of the times and even that fragment. What is of interest, visit: www.fai.org.lb) Hollywood, through the American at this instant, is the state of initial 2 I am not dismissing here any film journals that he used to buy. cognition before any meaning is possible reading of a visual Any attempts to read Van Leo’s generated, or synthesised by the fragment or of an entire work outside given socio-political or photographic work without situat- audience and before any links with cultural contexts. ing it in the context of the visual other fragments get drawn. I am 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 103

attracted by the fact that the a narrative, whether in a fiction film, Arabic word nazra, which means a in a documentary, on the news or ‘view’ or a ‘glance’, also means even in a descriptive caption at the ‘point of view’. Nazra is explained bottom of a photograph. If the initial linguistically as the singular of the role of photographs, films or videos act of seeing, al nazar3.The term is to invite their audience to ‘look’ for this act is constantly meant, before they are entertained, even defined, in a plural sense – as seduced, refreshed, provoked or if the one fragment of an act of impressed, then the value in ques- seeing signifies a piercing, sharp and tion, is simply:That which is looked focused point of view4. at.What I’m referring to is as Evidence is a narrative element straightforward as a photograph of a and is rooted in belief, i.e. that colour scale. Imagine the spectrum which lies in the audience’s minds. It of colours in a photograph relative is fascinating to observe, for exam- to its reference on the visual scale. If ple, how popular films invite the the film development is done viewer to – willingly – suspend and according to recommended stan- re-establish belief several times in dards, colours should be exactly the the course of one film. For exam- same in both the visual scale and in ple, in the Egyptian film entitled its photographic representation. Ghazal el-Banat (Anouar Wagdi, In the film Ghazal el Banat, Layla Egypt, 1949), one observes this (Layla Murad) and her Arabic complex system of encoding within teacher, Hamam (Naguib El Rihani), a film’s narrative in order to make a seek refuge in a villa late at night in work ‘believable’, even when it is order to avoid an insolent intruder. not. If the elements of evidence are After knocking on the villa door, used in order to make one believe they discover the house is that of what is hard to believe, then one the famous actor Yussef Wahbi,

wonders:What is the value of this who plays himself as a guest star in 3 Baalbaki, Munir & Rohi, Al-Mawrid evidence? And once those elements the film. Layla is surprised to see Dictionary, Beirut: Dar el-Ilm are stripped from the faith in them – him face-to-face and is ecstatic to Lilmalayin Publishers, 2001. when used in a different context – , find out that Wahbi is hosting 4 Similarly, isolating one frame of a what possibly remains? In my opin- singer Mohamad Abdel Wahab. film and video that captures live action allows one to perceive ion, what remains is simply the Abdel Wahab is getting ready to this action differently, providing document value of the fragment. In rehearse Aashik el Ruh before a an opportunity for a different this context, value is defined as the large orchestra. In this late night reading of that fragment. In my video installation entitled precise and strictest minimum used cinematic fantasy, which regroups Another Resolution, Beirut: Ayloul to describe what is referred to in together four major film celebrities, Festival, 1998, I asked people to this photograph, film or video. It is Yussef Wahbi and Abdel Wahab’s stand in poses that were inspired by photographs of chil- information that is so basic, so clear, characters are treated differently dren, while my video camera that the existence of which – unde- from the other two. was running.The result was a niably facing a camera – cannot be, Unlike Layla Murad and Naguib combination of frozen action with a moving background, at all, questioned. el Rihani,Yussef Wahbi and Abdel which was intended to attract Studying the work in isolated Wahab preserve their ‘real charac- the viewer to the eroticism fragments allows for the possibility ters’, as they contribute to the existing in the original photographs. Please refer to: Zaatari, of looking at a set of visual traits narrative of the film. In other Akram, Another Resolution, Beirut: before they get appropriated within words,Yussef Wahbi plays the Mind the gap, 1998.

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character of Yussef Wahbi, and Since the icon, within this film’s Abdel Wahab sings as Abdel context, refers to a famous person- Wahab5. It is possible for one to ality in film history, and belief argue that these characters are depends on the audience’s knowl- simply cultural landmarks, icons or edge of Wahbi’s previous films and textual references introduced with- plays, it is valid to claim that this is a in this context exactly as a possible cinema of historical and popular visit to the Cairo tower or the notoriety, to the extent to which it Pyramids in an Egyptian film would can be considered self-referential. be. However, as it is unusual for an One might, also, rightly see this actor to be as passive as a monu- scene as an attempt to penetrate a ment with respect to a film’s star’s intimate life, even if this life has narrative – in the sense that actors been staged for the sake of the film. are expected to interact with one This tactic, or ‘artistic license’, takes another – , such blocking of inter- advantage of the audience’s action introduces an ambiguous voyeuristic tendency and their situation that can be believable only curiosity about what Wahbi’s house through the faith of the spectators, might look like, how he might whether this blocking happens on behave at home, who might be in the level of ‘seeing’ – as is the case his company, etc. But, when faced with Abdel Wahab, who doesn’t with the historical reality of the film even notice the presence of the girl industry in Egypt,Wahbi’s role – like and her teacher6 – or on the level Abdel Wahab’s – is perceived and of ‘recognition’ – as is the case with recognised as a character in a bub- Yussef Wahbi. ble. It is a one-way recognition that Layla and Hamam recognise can be identified as iconic recogni- Yussef Wahbi as the writer and tion, where the two characters are comedian Yussef Wahbi, who – and transformed into screen-figures. contrary to what one would nor- What appears to be a window into mally expect – doesn’t recognise an icon’s daily life is more of a them, as if he is seeing them for showcase display. the first time, although the pair – if What we are watching is a pre- one considers the level of the two staged intrusion that is at the actors’ stardom – are equally service of the star system, which

5 This is not the only example famous. Ironically, Layla Murad’s aims to seduce more audience; the where Egyptian film stars play character’s name in the film is also plot is pre-scripted and, contrary to their own characters in a Layla Murad. But her character is its obvious claim of penetrating the film. Hind Rostom played a memorable role in Fatin not representing the star ‘Layla star’s daily life, it reinforces a ‘halo’ Abdel Wahab’s Isha’et Hobb Murad’, who everyone is familiar around the star. In simple terms, it (A Love Rumour, Egypt, 1960), with and that the audience knows. communicates the following:That as did Ismail Yassine in several of his films. If one were to apply the idea of even if you – as an audience – suc- the visual scale, such a plot would ceed in breaking into this actor’s life, 6 Layla Murad played the leading female role with fail and thus, threaten the unity and you will experience what looks like Mohamad Abdel Wahab in credibility of the film. Only faith, a film; and furthermore, it is a film Mohamad Karim’s Yahya el this predetermined submission with which you are familiar. Hob (Long Live Love, Egypt, 1937), and even sang with him from the part of the audience, Abdel Wahab’s stardom is rein- the duet, Yadi Naim. makes it believable. forced when Wahbi invites Layla 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 105

and Hamam to listen to Abdel reinforces the existing image of 7 In the second part of his auto- Wahab give a spectacular per- himself. If I were to describe biographical trilogy, Haddutah Masriyah,(An Egyptian Story, formance, while he is unaware of Wahbi as a screen figure in this 1982),Yousef Chahine includes their presence.Two points are film, then Abdel Wahab can be a scene that he filmed in the interesting here.The first is the described as an icon on the wall early 1970s revealing Oum Koulthoum singing on stage. In assumption that the audience is to behind Wahbi. He is set in a the film, this scene is intercut believe this plot; and, the second deeper level within the film, and with another scene which is how the role played by Abdel does not interact with any of the zooms-in on the actor Nour el Sherif, playing Chahine, while Wahab is reduced to strictly actors. His act is so simple that sitting in the audience.The singing, to the extent that it one can no longer consider it act- spectator is led to believe that becomes legitimate to pose the ing. It is such a simple act, an act Chahine is watching Oum Koulthoum sing. However, the question, is he ‘performing’ for the as simple as chewing gum, which spectator is also aware that, at film, or is it true that he is ‘really’ leads me to why and how Red the time the film was shot, and singing? 7 He simply sings which, in Chewing Gum was born. at the age in which Nour el Sherif appears in this film, Oum my opinion, adds to his aura, and Koulthoum had been deceased for years. Oum Koulthoum’s role is restricted to singing here, as if documentary material, shot previously, was used to give credibility to the narrative of the film.

Red Chewing Gum was my contribution to the Hamra Street Project, curated by Ashkal Alwan in 2000,to reflect on the rise and fall of this famed Beirut street.The project allowed for debate to take place around the street’s pivotal history in the city and its present condition. I wanted to stage a scene of a boy chewing gum; videotaping this scene over and over, adding new information in each take, removing the viewer one step further away from the plot.The image of the boy chewing red gum becomes like a recurring icon that acquires more meaning as the video unfolds.The work was conducted on two levels, adapting my personal interest in pursuit, as a structure, to my commitment to the nature of the street.The work plays on the theme of consumption, which I found relevant to a commercial street such as Hamra. (video, 10 minutes, 2000)

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Baalbeck (a collaboration with Ghassan Salhab and Mohammad Soueid) is a three-part road film, set between Beirut and Baalbeck, where two men – a journalist and a photographer – cross the country from west to east, from the coast up to the Syrian borders, in order to cover a story about the Syrian singer Sabah Fakhry.Their journey is repeated three times, according to three interpretations, conceived and realised by the three of us. As in Red Chewing Gum, I work on the idea of pursuit as the two journalists get attracted to a young man, and decide to deviate from their original itinerary in order to follow him.Their attraction – as it is presented in the video – is blurred, something between potential investigation and physical desire. I find the two very related.The two characters desire this man, but they do not admit it to themselves, let alone to society.They justify their pursuit of him with the pretext of the investigation, where their desire of him is camou- flaged with suspicion. Pursuit is a form which can be interpreted as both desire and/or investigation. I take their interest in the man as a pretext to penetrate a person’s life and explore his cultural identity.Take, for example, the idea of collecting what the young man uses, then throws on the road; a chocolate wrapping, an empty soft drink can or lip balm.They even go so far as to look into his clothes and make a detailed inventory of his possessions. For me, this description provides the work with an opening into the intimate world of this person, just as an X-ray would. I asked the young man (Nabil Kojok) to take his handbag with him to the set, and asked the two journalists to start describing and to take notes on its contents. (video, 60 minutes, 2001) 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 107

The concept behind How I Love You was born after Majnounak (Crazy for You, video, 26 minutes, Ayloul Festival, 1997), which provided a platform for three men to speak ‘proudly’ about their conquests of the other gender, describing their sexual encounters in detail. Majnounak was meant to be a critique of the definition of masculinity, as it is conceived and propagated by men – in general – in contemporary Lebanon. How I Love You extends the exploration of male sexuality to homosexuality. I wanted the images to portray traces of the time and location in which they were being produced, which led to a blurring and the overexposure of the image, as homosexuality is still considered illegal in Lebanon. (video, 29 minutes, 2001)

All is Well on the Border explores the Lebanese-Israeli conflict in South Lebanon through its mediated/televised images.The manipulation of television images is emphasised, sometimes by playing with speed and other times, by separating sound from its corresponding image.The video shows staged interviews with former Lebanese detainees in Israeli prisons as a comment, a self-mediation. All is Well on the Border aims to deconstruct the conventional narratives of resistance by breaking myths of the hero/traitor, the victor/victim and illustrating the impossibility of representing a conflict without further constructing oppositions. (video, 43 minutes, 1997)

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For me, Image + Sound was based on de-contextualising televised images. It is not only a fieldwork of interpretation, but also a critique of the entertainment value of broadcast television.The technique used was to choose one location, shoot totally improvised scenes – inspired from that location in one afternoon – and attempt to complement them with a selection chosen from television archives, in a quest to generate a third interpretation. (video, 5-7 minutes, 1995-96)

Born in Lebanon, in 1966,Akram Zaatari is a video artist and curator who lives and works in Beirut. He is author of more than thirty videos, among which are: How I Love You (29 min, 2001), Her + Him Van Leo (32 min, 2001), Crazy for You (27 min, 1997), All is Well on the Border (43 min, 1997), The Candidate (10 min, 1996); and two video installations: Another Resolution and Monument # 5:The Scandal. He is co-founder of the Arab Image Foundation (Beirut), through which he developed his recent research-based work on the photographic history of the Middle East.This work became the basis for a series of exhibitions: The Vehicle: Picturing Moments of Transition in a Modernizing Society, Portraits du Caire:Van Leo,Arman,Alban and Mapping Sitting: On Portraiture and Photography (in collaboration with Walid Raad). He has edited or co-edited three publications of the same titles. He has been published in critical and scholarly journals such as: Parachute, Camera Austria, Framework, Transition, Bomb magazine, Al-Adaab, al-Nahar and Zawaya. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 109

Appendix Ghazal el Banat (Anouar Wagdi, 1949) Excerpts from film dialogue:

Sleiman: Yes? Wait a bit. Pardon me, but Basha who lives at the end of the street. what do you want? Yussef Wahbi: Welcome. Please have a seat. Hamam: A glass of water. What honour grants me this nice visit? Sleiman: A glass of water? Why, what do Layla: In reality… you think this is… a café? Hamam: In reality, we… we… Hamam: We are thirsty. Is water that expen- Layla: We were having a walk, out to get sive? some fresh air. Sleiman: It is not a matter of being expen- Hamam: We have to leave. sive, but you are knocking on people’s Yussef Wahbi: houses at this hour asking for water? But isn’t it early? Sleiman: Hamam: Isn’t this Ismail Bey’s house? Sir, Mr. Mohamad Abdel Wahab says he’s ready. Sleiman: Who’s Ismail Bey? Yussef Wahbi: OK. I’m coming. Hamam: Ismail Bey Abu Manakhir. Layla: Mohamad Abdel Wahab? The singer? Sleiman: There is no one by that name Yussef Wahbi: here. Yes he is here, inside. Layla: Hamam: Maybe it is the house before or It’s not possible! after this one? Yussef Wahbi: Don’t you believe me? Sleiman: It is neither. Hamam: Let’s go. Hamam: Then maybe we went to the Layla: Wait. He is going to sing now. wrong street? Good-bye. Hamam: Sing? Oh my God! Save us from Sleiman: You are not going anywhere but to this hell. Abdel Wahab and Yussef Wahbi the police station.You are burglars. in the same house.We escape one guy Mohamad, Osman, tie them up.These are and fall in the hands of others! new tricks that you have invented to rob Layla: Is it true that Abdel Wahab will sing people’s houses, you burglars! now? Yussef Wahbi: What’s the story Sleiman? Yussef Wahbi: Yes. He will sing an excerpt Who are these people? from my last novel, which I am writing for Sleiman: Sir? him. Layla: Yussef Wahbi? Oh my God! Layla: What is this novel about? Hamam: Mr.Yussef Wahbi, the movie star? Yussef Wahbi: It is about a man who loves a Oh shit! woman so much that he cannot but see Layla: Bonsoir Monsieur. her happy, even if her happiness is with another man. Yussef Wahbi: Bonsoir? You mean bonjour. Layla: It’s almost dawn. Anything I can help you This is a great story. I am sure it will with? be very successful. Yussef Wahbi: Layla:Yes. Ehh… Please tell him why we’re Hush! Listen! Abdel Wahab is here. about to start. Hamam: Because… because we love trouble. Layla: Mr. Hamam? What’s the matter with him? Yussef Wahbi: But I don’t get it.Who is he? Yussef Wahbi: Ms. Layla, this man loves you. Layla: He is my teacher and his name is Hamam. Layla: Don’t say that. He loves me? Yussef Wahbi: Your name is Hamam Yussef Wahbi:To the point of craziness (pigeon)? Layla:That’s not possible! Hamam: Yes my name is Hamam.They gave Yussef Wahbi:Why not? Many novelists me this name so people would make fun have addressed this subject, including me. of me. Layla:Thank you. Yussef Wahbi: And you? Yussef Wahbi: Hey… What is life, if not a Hamam: She is Layla, the daughter of Murad great theatre?

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Shahrzad: Political Art Brochure

Tirdad Zolghadr

One of the many reasons I Indeed, there’s little point in didn’t pursue an academic career, going on about Shahrzad for thirty was that I not only have consider- minutes, because: able difficulty concentrating on a) It would remove the ambiguity painfully systematic, conscientious and the potential misunder- analyses of a single topic for a standings that are the most longer period of time, but I also interesting aspects of a project realised that it just wasn’t neces- such as this; and, sary. In order to make a relevant b) It’s more fun, or more engaging, point about contemporary cultur- if you will, to see Shahrzad as a al practices, there is no reason a cross-point between different text or discourse should have to issues – issues which, according declare its function and intention to where you are and when you and then politely do all it can to happen to be there, are very avoid disappointing anyone. different in relevance. Actually, it presumably stands to gain from expectations being So, I’ve decided to make a brief hopelessly overheated. tour of what might be most inter- I would compare Shahrzad, the esting to a Beirut audience of project I’m here to present, to an international illuminati as you are. exotic pack of foreign cigarettes Shahrzad is a project realised by that you place on a bar counter Shirana Shahbazi, Manuel Krebs and which allows you to get into (also known as Rashid Tehrani) and conversations with people you myself. All three of us currently live would otherwise never have met. in Zurich. Shirana is an Iranian pho- Obviously, the conversation need tographer who grew up in Tehran not revolve around the cigarette and Stuttgart. She is currently pack itself.The cigarettes actually enjoying an impressive amount of only offer a pretext, they’re inter- international attention thanks to a esting only in that they create a photo series, Goftare Nik, which situation in which a conversation shows urban panoramas and staged can unfold. everyday situations in the life of an 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 111

upper middle class family in Tehran. Let me begin with Zurich. Manuel Krebs co-founded a graphic design bureau,‘Norm’, which pro- Zurich duces very heady, minimalist, Censorship isn’t an issue in Swiss-German design. Norm are, at Switzerland. At the moment, the pub- present, working on their second lic debate that might come closest to book, a critical and theoretical the problematics of censorship is the inquiry into the history of the strong and increasingly obvious link Latin alphabet. between culture and commerce.This Shahrzad is a project that is debate is, actually, very valuable and intended, in time, to grow into instructive to anyone from the something bigger.We hope to be Middle East who is confronted with publishing two issues a year, includ- issues of, what I like to refer to as, ing new collaborators incrementally. ‘ethnic marketing’ in the West. One One of the basic precepts, or could equally speak of showcasing, parameters, behind Shahrzad is the presenting, representing or exhibiting idea of combining political content the Middle East, rather than ‘market- with cheap, but good, design.We ing’ it. But, I’d say ‘marketing’ is a more think it’s a shame that politicised honest term; referring, as it does, to publications have such an arrière- matters pertaining to global econom- garde attitude to form and ics, to fluctuating supply and demand self-marketing; and, that magazines and to strategy and self-packaging. with high aesthetic standards are so At this point, allow me to make busy being post-feminist, or antipo- a brief aside. Arriving at the Home litically-correct or whatever. Works forum, I couldn’t help but Although the format, the volume notice an implicit sense of embar- and the topics will change, the rassment in the air.The idea or stance will remain the same, i.e. that impression was that, with a semi-war of picking up heavy-handed topics going on next door, this was not the and utilising them to do something place or time to be thinking about new.The topic addressed most art, culture and other frivolous, directly in this issue of Shahrzad is abstract matters. In the face of the censorship. Censorship is a good ongoing invasion of Palestine, what is example of a very rich subject – the point of talking about Zurich with deep and complex links to bankers sponsoring art exhibitions? issues of class, property and repre- I’d simply like to insist that none sentation – that is dealt with in a of what we’re doing here is abstract. very hackneyed way. There’s absolutely nothing abstract in We planned the project in standing here at the microphone Switzerland, but collected the talking to you. It’s no more abstract material, designed and printed it in than digging ditches or, incidentally, Iran; and, are now distributing it handing out Hizbullah flyers at a sit- back in Switzerland. So, this first in.The difference between digging issue of Shahrzad touches on ditches and what we’re doing here Western Europe and the Middle lies not in the degree of abstraction, East, which offers a good pretext but in the degree of privilege, to subdivide my talk. authority and influence; the privilege

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of leaving traces within those institu- the new links between culture and tions which, in turn – albeit in the commerce are actually one of the very long run – , play a crucial role in few, clear and unmistakable recent shaping ideologies of representation. developments.You have the gala It’s striking how, especially in Europe, dinners for the United Bank of people, who can be so critical and Switzerland at the City Theatre, you articulate when it comes to anything have receptions for petrochemical from TV advertising to video art, corporations in trendy, underground become blubbering illiterates, help- discotheques and you obviously less in the face of political fashions have the many galleries and cultural and tacit censorship, as soon as centres funded entirely by private we’re dealing with the Islamic world. corporations.What is eerie about At the risk of sounding like I were the situation is that, in many ways, preaching, if there were a more intel- there really isn’t anything wrong ligent approach to the complexities with it. Hardly anyone would dispute of representation, aesthetics and the fact that, ever since its wholesale geopolitics and to what I referred to artistic privatisation, the genius loci as ‘ethnic marketing’, we wouldn’t hasn’t lost anything in critical spirit. quite be where we are now. Some even say it is far more lively and provocative than before. Back to Zurich. Yet, there are things that make I’d last lived in Switzerland as a you wonder. In 1991, there was a teenager. Now, having just moved nationwide initiative to commemo- back to Zurich from Tehran, I’d say rate the mythical founding of 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 113

Switzerland in 1291.Then, the intel- and interpreted. As law professor ligentsia made a laughing stock of Stanley Fish likes to put it, rules the organisers by boycotting the make sense only “in reference to celebrations, preferring to decon- the regularities they are thought to struct the 700-year myth in the bring about”. In short, even rules press, and to happily mock the and institutions change over time. very idea of patriotism and nation- Orientalism itself has changed. hood. Now, only eleven years later, I’m not wagging my finger at there is to be another nationwide, anyone. I, myself, have accepted a cultural celebration of vaguely mandate for the expo. As for the patriotic temperament, the expo Shahrzad collective, we’re open to nationale 02.This year, however, the collaborating with almost anyone. entire intelligentsia is desperate to But, the project is indeed intended join, everyone jostling for a place in to remain independent. And, since the sun. Once it was clear-cut the brochure isn’t sponsored, it’s political positioning. Now, it’s Rem admittedly a little expensive. Koolhaas surfing the wave, So, what might I expect you to Chairman Mao’s fish in the water know about Switzerland? I’m sure and whatnot, everyone happily you’ve heard of Heidi. reworking the system from within. Last summer, we commemorated A word on this notion of out- 100 years since the death of Johanna witting the mainstream: Of course, Spyri, whose Heidis Lehr-und one can merge with one’s institu- Wanderjahre is one of the most pop- tional setting and then avoid, as ular novels ever published.Yet, much as possible, the blunt content despite the book’s extraordinary and formal polish the latter is accus- international success in the 1880s, the tomed to. Unfortunately, this tactic book was only published in usually amounts to little more than Switzerland in 1918, years after Spyri’s congratulating select readers, view- death.This differentiation between ers and listeners for recognising cultural export products and what is one’s nifty nuances for what they consumed within the country is are. In other words, very ironically, rather widespread through the con- one runs the risk of becoming even temporary Third World; and, it must more exclusive and elitist than ever sound familiar to you. before. Moreover, to assume that an A century after Spyri’s death, institution’s rules and codes of con- another Swiss author, with a similar duct are obvious enough to be knack for landscape exotica, gained penetrated and reworked from international attention. Novelist Tom within, is to pay them an unearned Kummer lives and works in Los compliment, and to help occlude Angeles, from where he peddles the ways through which they standard, folkloric Americana:The become transparent to themselves. Nevada desert, amphetamines, free- Codes, laws and canons don’t just ways, the LAPD. Occasionally, drop from the sky into a cultural Kummer would sell interviews with vacuum. Laws have a circular, mutu- Hollywood celebrities to the ally dependent relationship to the European press.These he made up field of action in which they’re read himself. His interview with Ivana

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Trump consisted of Andy Warhol art and ethnic marketing,Western quotations. One day, it all ‘came out’, institutions that never question the and Kummer was attacked by a apolitical nonchalance of the local scandalised public, including his own Kunstbetrie, suddenly demand the one-time friends and associates. ‘Political’ and the ‘Uncompromising’, The tragic tale of Tom Kummer preferably with a pinch of women’s goes beyond the tired dilemma rights. Please find a clever, sexy way between the reality of fiction and to condemn your regime. vice-versa. It draws our attention to So, to come back to our art the middleman, the representative brochure on how to represent and himself.The latter is caught between talk about censorship in Iran in the what German-speakers call vertreten present context – as I’ve just (substituting someone or some- described it. Censorship, of all things. thing;‘rhetoric as persuasion’) and Each time you start victimising the darstellen (description;‘rhetoric as ‘Middle East’ or the ‘Third World’, trope’). As Ms. Gayatri Spivak has you inevitably strengthen the wide- pointed out: In English, the term spread idea of the impossibility of ‘representation’ is used for both. intellectual work occurring outside The interest, with respect to Tom the Western teaching machine. And, Kummer, is that Kummer was tried you make yourself – the ethnic exile and convicted on the grounds of – look fabulous by comparison. being a dishonest journalist; i.e., by Indeed, insisting on the role of a resorting to some press ethos that crushed Third World race, rather has more to do with a 19th century than on considerations of class or gentlemen’s agreement than with gender, is exactly what a Zurich- the world of ethnic marketing and based male academic with a racy, cultural commodification that has Third World complexion could use. grown around us. And, what I’m So much for Zurich. saying is that, compared to the reality-fiction problematic, the tension Iran between ‘metaphoric’ vertretung and Regarding the Middle East, ‘metonymic’ darstellung offers ethical rather than speaking of contempo- and epistemological stakes that are rary Iran per se, I have decided to decidedly more challenging.To us, speak of an historical era that has here, these stakes are valuable and fascinated me for some time now. instructive – we, who at this forum, The era brings to a point the issues are trying to forge international links of representation and ideology in throughout the Middle East, and relation to property and exile, and who, on the other hand, are jostling simultaneously addresses the rela- for our places in the postcolonial, tion of Iran to Israel and, in a way, Western art market, where, indeed, to the Arab countries. the recent interest in non-Western I’d like to tell you a bible story. art and cinema has brought a great I suppose you’ll agree that, when demand for spokespersons and eth- it comes to the Bible, the Old nic exiles to pat on the back. Testament stories that one is most What is worth noting here is familiar with are the first myths that, when it comes to Third World (Paradise, Babel, Noah’s Ark), 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 115

the first nomads (Sarah and urbanisation and for ghettoising Abraham), and, of course, Moses entire populations.These ethnically and the return to the Promised distinct units were encouraged to Land.You will agree that that is hold their proper, popular cults and pretty much it, as far as the com- emblems – which allowed for an mon imaginary goes, before getting appeasement of anti-Persian senti- to Joseph and the Virgin Mary.What ment – and were also assigned is most striking about this chasm is specific economic functions, which that the gap between the mythical permitted a more efficient and events marked by ‘Moses’ and ‘Mary’ profitable administration of the amounts to a period of six cen- imperial body. turies. It was in the course of this In recent years, scholars such as epoch – which constitutes one of Ronald Carrol, Philip Davies,Tamara the most neglected areas in what Eskenazi, Harold Washington, Joseph they call Syro-Palestinian archaeology Blenkinsopp and Charles Carter – that Israel was colonised by Persia have been insisting that the Jewish for approximately two centuries. return from Babylonian exile under Although two hundred years of the Achaemenid Empire, as narrat- colonisation may sound like a long ed in the Old Testament, is not to time, nothing spectacular or histori- be taken at face value.Why should cally decisive is known to have this particular version of events be happened during that period. On representative for the population as the contrary, as many have been a whole? The sources from both quick to point out, the Persians within and without the biblical cor- were different from other imperial- pus are ambiguous as to just how ists:They invited the Jews back harsh the Babylonian exile really home from exile under the was, and as to the exact reason the Babylonians to live in peace, do exiles were willing to come back. their thing and practice their reli- They do suggest, rather less gion, exactly the way they liked it. ambiguously, that, at best, the Many biblical scholars even hesitate returnees formed a fraction of the to call Israel a colony; and some local population, and that they were even hold that, under the domina- granted exclusive privileges by the tion of the Achaemenids, Hebraism Persian authorities, e.g. land rights knew its ‘Golden Age’. and control over the official cult. The Pax Iranica, one assumes, This newly-formed gathering allowed Hebrew culture the leisure found itself under the aegis of a siz- to manifest itself according to the able empire, which declared its most authentic tendencies. And since, members the colony’s official as some like to say, peace is boring, spokesmen. Although they could it’s no surprise that neither Ezra, not control the locals, with their Nehemia nor any other hero from paganisms, intermarriages and mud- the ‘Golden Age’ are the main charac- dled oral histories, they had the ters in kindergarten colouring books. texts; they wrote the official histo- Generally, Persians were well ries as they wrote the land grants, known for their unflinching policies along with the marriage certificates, of forced resettlement and de- for that matter. A new cult of the

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forefathers emerged in Israel during gy, Zoroastrianism, like Judaism, this era, a shift in discursive empha- forged a single and personal God. sis towards kinship rather than Thirdly, much as the Zoroastrian territory; one that is unmistakably Ahura Mazda is not a universal reflected in most biblical stories of God, but God of the Persian the period (e.g. Naboth, Joseph, Aryans, Jehovah is the God of the Esther and Ruth). Lineage was an children of Israel; both are deities obvious way to define who was with a racial and national character, clearly Jewish, and the only method and not gods of all mankind. available to authorising newcomers Fourthly, neither doctrine encour- to reclaim lands long appropriated ages proselytism across racial by those who had stayed behind boundaries, preferring to prosely- under the Babylonians. tise within the ethnic body and to A big question here, in light of systematically uphold the faith in these one-time political interests, is the nation. the issue of whether, at the end of In Europe, after having gone out the day, it is Moses or Persia’s of style during the Middle Ages, but Ahura Mazda who is the actual key still well before Nietzsche’s famous to Judeo-Christian monotheism. ‘Zarathustra’, the prophet Zoroaster The two are uneasy bedfellows; was rehabilitated by a host of but, Moses and Mazda do have cultured celebrities from the things in common. Like Judaism, European Enlightenment, ranging Zoroastrian philosophy isn’t a con- from Rousseau to Voltaire to Goethe templative understanding of the and also Mozart and Delacroix, who impersonal concepts and processes all considered, in their respective of the universe (as in, say, Hellenism ways, that the wisdom, dignity and or Buddhism), but is directed purity of Zoroaster indeed made towards active participation in a him the earliest pillar of civilisation. personal and cosmic struggle with G.W. Friedrich Hegel, always one for the forces of good and evil. Second, little timetables and marching orders, out of an initial, complex cosmolo- declared the Persians “the first historical people”. As many, including Edward Said, have pointed out, this was the precise time when the theory of the Aryan Urheimat began to emerge in the West, and the Aryan myth began to dominate historical and cultural anthropology.

I’d like to conclude by reading a few excerpts from the brochure:

In Farsi: ‘SANSUR’, from the Latin ‘CENSURA’, meaning ‘to test or evaluate’. ‘CENSIO’ – ‘in my opinion’. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 117

“Next time, don’t tell the foreigners.Tell us first, and we’ll take care of it”, said the secret police to the BBC correspondent. “I don’t tell foreigners about [censored]’s little obsessions. It’s too embarrassing. [censored] is the founder of the [censored]. Even in Iran, the use of his writings and speeches are subject to severe restrictions.This is why the use of his writings and speeches are subject to severe restrictions. Nonetheless, the use of his writings and speeches are subject to severe restrictions”. The Roman ‘CENSOR’: a magistrate whose original functions were registering citizens and their property. Gradually, however, the censor was charged with supervising the moral conduct of senators. Senators were voted into office by citizens with property previously registered by the censor. Mingle with the Tehran intelligentsia. Have a Winston Red at Café Shukaa. Censorship is a red herring. The real problems: Bad taste, provincialism, money.

Tirdad Zolghadr is an independent journalist and translator who lives and works in Tehran and Zurich.In Tehran,he co-founded the online magazine badjens.com, curated the multimedia art exhibition group- project and co-directed the documentary film, Tehran 1380.

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PERFORMANCES

Tabla Dubb:An Audio-Visual Performance, Hassan Khan Biokhraphia, Lina Saneh and Rabih Mroué Ode to Rhinos, Nadine R. L.Touma 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 120

Tabla Dubb: An Audio-Visual Performance

Hassan Khan

Hassan Khan works in the audio-visual medium, producing videos and video installations, as well as composing soundtracks for theatre and contemporary dance. His work has been installed, exhibited and screened in festivals, art galleries and public spaces in Europe,Asia, the United States and, of course, Egypt and the region. Hassan Khan lives and works in Cairo, Egypt.

tabla dubb attempted to fashion a the insecurities of having to constantly public media that uses the basic define one's identity are hopefully element of popular musical culture sidestepped. Connecting the music to without engaging in the reductionist a library of video images that arise discussions around the 'traditional and out of an imagistic engagement with contemporary' imposed by the orien- the city, mixed with directed and talising discourses of dominant repeated statements, the perform- institutions.This performance was an ance was an invitation to ponder attempt at creating a new cultural upon the relation that the body practice where music, video and the politic holds with itself. Moving to the direct statement were used to investi- music, while consuming the 'direct gate, in a concise and concentrated statement', is an alternative to mass form, the politic of shared co-habita- media that is neither parodic nor tion, in a city where power is ironic. tabla dubb is to be performed contested on a daily basis. It is a in Cairo and Alexandria, in public moment of cultural production where spaces and under tents on streets. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 121

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Biokhraphia

Lina Saneh and Rabih Mroué Translated from Arabic by Mona Abu Rayyan

Lina Saneh, born in Beirut, has been working in the field of theatre since 1990. Rabih Mroué, born in Beirut, has been working in the field of visual arts since 1990.

Audio: She studied theatre at the Audio: As we all know, you are an Institut des Beaux Arts, part of accomplished artist… creative the Faculty of Fine Arts at the as well. Lebanese University. She received Artist:… her doctorate in theatre from the Audio: And you were raised in a Sorbonne III in Paris. She is an family of artists… artist of a special calibre. She Artist:… adores culture, knowledge and Audio: Let’s not forget your Aunt theatre. She’s a homebody. She Madonna Ghazi. For those who spends her time reading and don’t know Madonna Ghazi, seeking knowledge on all matters Madonna Ghazi is one of the related to theatre. She has partici- most important actresses in pated in many festivals in the cinema… Arab world and internationally. Artist: in theatre… She presented her last theatrical Audio:That’s right, in theatre. She pieces in Beirut, Amman, Paris, worked with the most influential Tunis, Brussels, among others. She directors of the sixties and sev- is currently in the process of pre- enties:The Rahbani Brothers, senting a new theatrical work, Samir Nasri, and Tele Liban. entitled Biokhraphia, in collabora- Artist: and Raymond Jbara… tion with the theatre director Audio: Of course, we mustn’t for- Rabih Mroué. get Mr. Raymond Jbara. We would like to take advantage Our interview, today, will focus of her presence with us here on your new work.Why did you today, in this auditorium, to inter- call it ‘Biokhraphia’? view her and get to know her Artist: Biokhraphia is composed of better. Welcome, Lina Saneh. two words: Bio, stemming from Artist:Thank you. the Ancient Greek term ‘Bios’, Audio: Please speak into the micro- i.e. Life; and life is the antonym phone. of death… Artist:Thank you.Thank you very Audio: Ok. Biokhraphia is clear… much. biography. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 123

But, why did you record this and I don’t want to deal with it. cassette using your own voice If I’m going to see a play, I get all to interview yourself? stressed out and I don’t want to Artist: It’s natural to record it in deal with that, either. my voice. Audio: So why did you choose the- Audio: Why? atre? Artist: I read it in a book some- Artist: I can’t remember now. where. Maybe to piss my parents off. It Audio: What book? was wartime, and I didn’t know Artist: A book that says that after what I wanted to do with death, everyone interviews one’s myself. So, I did theatre. self. One asks oneself questions Audio: Any regrets? and one answers one’s ques- Artist: No. tions. So I said to myself, why Audio: Did you get involved in not record all the questions I’ve politics? always wanted to ask myself, but Artist: Yes. Of course.We all got haven’t been able to answer? involved in politics. Audio: Like what, for example? Audio: Right or Left? Artist: Like a lot of things. For Artist: Left. example:Why theatre? What is Audio: Speak into the microphone. theatre? What’s the significance Artist: Left. of theatre? What’s the role of Audio: Did you fight? theatre? Artist: I wanted to fight. Audio: Really? You’d like me to ask Audio: Did you fight? you these types of questions? Artist: I wanted to fight. But I was Artist: I don’t know. No, I wouldn’t scared.You know, combat zones, like that. Of course not. trenches, barricades… there’s a Audio: Then what? lot of cockroaches and rats. And I Artist: I don’t know.You start. I like really got scared. For example, I surprises. really wanted to be part of the Audio: What is the significance of resistance and carry out military theatre, in your opinion? operations. I believed in it. A lot of Artist: The significance of theatre? my friends were martyred; others Audio: Surprised? were detained.That also scared Artist: Yes. I’m surprised. I don’t me. I used to think maybe I would know. get detained. I’m sure there are Audio: Really? lots of insects in detention cen- Artist: Maybe it’s important. Maybe tres.There’s another thing… it’s not. I don’t know anymore. Audio: What? What is the significance of the- Artist: Menstruation. atre? If I think about all the plays Audio: Yes? I’ve seen in my life, I think: So Artist: Until now, I’ve never been what? What did they do for me? sure whether or not they pro- Maybe, if anything, theatre bene- vide sanitary napkins in detention fited me as a profession, as a centres. And this really bugs me. hobby. But now, if I think about Audio: So, you didn’t fight? performing, I get all stressed out Artist: No.

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Audio: And the bullet in your leg? have troubles? Artist: It’s a wound. Artist: No, no. A regular childhood. Audio: From what? Audio: And, how did your parents Artist: In the war, once, I saw a guy treat you? from a militia… I don’t know Artist: Normal. Like parents. which militia… I went to him Audio: So how come you have this and I started to heckle him… If profound sensitivity? you’re a man, you’ll shoot me. If Artist: Maybe my mom? No. you’re a man, you’ll shoot. Shoot, Everyone in my family is sensitive you dog.You loser.You lowlife. and we are all easily touched. You coward.You chicken shit. Audio: By the way, how many times Shoot, you bastard, shoot. If you did the artist Lina Saneh try to had balls, you’d shoot. commit suicide? Audio: And what happened? Artist: Five times? Six times. Artist: He shot me in the leg. Audio: The family? Audio: And then what? Artist: No. No. It had nothing to Artist: Honestly? I regretted it. do with the family. Because now that I think about Audio: But in all your performances it, if I had brought a cameraman, you have ‘the family’, your family. and we had actually shot what And your family’s hysteria:The happened, it would have been a harsh, tyrannical father and the great performance.They would sweet, loving mother. have written about us in the Artist: This is a simplistic view, in all newspapers or something. senses of the word. Audio: Ok. Let’s talk a little bit Audio: Aristotle states that the more about you. family is the birthplace of Artist: What do you mean? tragedy, par excellence. Audio: Tell us about your child- Artist: Aristotle wasn’t talking hood. How was it? about psychology. Artist: Average. It’s not worth talk- Audio: But there are always these ing about. intense relationships in your Audio: You didn’t suffer? You didn’t work. Destructive conflicts, unbalanced personas, verbal and physical aggression, women versus men, men versus women… and what’s strange is that we always have the same amount of men versus the same amount of women. And there’s always the number three. Or the multiple of three. Does this symbolise destiny? Death? The Trinity? Artist: This is a metaphysical interpretation. It’s irrational. And I reject it. Audio: Ok. Maybe we need to read your work within a more com- 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 125

prehensive framework and not generation and which age. For to consider it as a singular example, if we take all those answer to a family issue. born between the sixties and Artist: By the way, my husband seventies, it would work.Yes. always said that the nicest gift a But, no. Because in the eighties, mother can give her son is to you have a generation who vanish as early as possible. I’m were born in 1975, 1976…. sorry… continue… These people might be included Audio: Biokhraphia… Let’s stay with within our generation – espe- Biokhraphia cially the ones born in April, Artist: Yes.That would be better. May, as well as some of whom Audio: Biokhraphia, in my opinion, is did their military service. In any the least successful of your case, we need to reevaluate works. And you exploited its those from 1966 and 1967 – failure to create a legend. maybe they shouldn’t be includ- Artist: Me? That’s not true. All my ed in our generation. Actually, life I’ve rejected and fought the they most likely shouldn’t be idea of the legend. First of all, included. because the legend – with all its Audio: But you’re all the war talk – eliminates politics. generation.You lived the civil Secondly, the legend creates war.You were affected by it. It’s worlds without histories. It oblit- imprinted on you. erates contradictions. It converts Artist: No. Me, for example… I meanings into forms. Please have nothing to do with the war refer to the lecture I gave at the generation. I always felt different. American University. Not like anyone else. I’m special. Audio: When was that? I had no A person like me could have idea. committed a personal revolution Artist: 1998. with or without a civil war, or any Audio: I wasn’t there. I didn’t other historical circumstance, for attend it. that matter. Artist: That’s not my problem. Audio: Why?… How?… Why?… Audio: What did you say? Artist: You’re asking me to get into Artist: It’s not important… go on. personal matters. Audio: All right. Can we consider Audio: But it’s important for us to Biokhraphia a political work that know. attempts to showcase your Artist: Ok. For a long time, I refused problems as a part of a younger to change my underwear. I think I generation, and your critical stayed in the same underwear stance against authority? for about six or seven months. Artist: Maybe… That’s possible. If Of course, I used to hide this you’d like. Why not? But, no… fact from everyone. Even my Definitely, no… Biokhraphia family, my mom, my sister… doesn’t, at all, have anything to none of them noticed anything. do with the stance and views of At some point, the smell became my generation. Actually, yes. overwhelming.Wherever I went, I Maybe. It depends on which was followed by a stench.

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In class. At home. In the elevator. exciting for the artist than any In my room.Wherever I went, other historical incident such as people avoided me. My friends the war, or the like. at school were the ones who Audio: Honestly, I’m not getting discovered that the smell was you… you lost me. from me.When they found out Artist: That’s strange.Why? at home, I expected to be pun- Audio: I’m just not getting it… let’s ished. But instead, they indulged start all over again. me; they gave me gifts. And Artist: Ok. No problem. since then, every time I get a whiff of a bad smell, I think that Artist stops the tape recorder they’re going to suspect it’s me. and rewinds the cassette to the This left a profound mark, deep beginning. within my being. So what is this? This is something that’s a hun- Audio: She studied theatre at the dred percent psychological. Institut des Beaux Arts, part of Private. Personal.This the Faculty of Fine Arts at the Kafkaesque relationship with Lebanese University. She received smell is a million times more her doctorate in theatre from…

Artist stops the tape recorder again, and now fast-forwards the cassette.

Audio: Our interview today will focus on your new work.Why did you call it ‘Biokhraphia’? Artist: Biokhraphia is a word which signifies nothing.We chose it because it has a nice ring to it. Audio: Ok. Biokhraphia is clear… biography. But, why did you record this cassette using your own voice to interview yourself? Artist: Ummm… How would I know? Do I have to answer this question? Audio: Why? Artist: Because it’s not important. Audio: All right then.What’s your definition of theatre? Artist: I reject all things theatre. Audio: Speak into the microphone… What’s your definition of theatre? Artist: I reject theatre and all that’s related to theatre. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 127

Audio: How can you articulate this about a dream, and I meant rejection? nothing else by it… And I don’t Artist: I don’t go. I don’t attend. I know why it came to mind – refuse to. Or, I sit in the front free association? row, bring my snacks, crunch on Audio: Ok… But what are you nuts and slurp on a soda. guys trying to do with theatre? Audio: Have you done this before? Artist: We’re doing theatre. Artist: Nope. Never. Audio: You mean that you consider Audio: Speak into the microphone. these performances you’ve been Artist: No. Never. presenting this past while Audio: What do you think of Rabih theatre? Mroué as a director? Artist: I would prefer to delay my Artist: Good. Good. But he doesn’t answer for the simple reason know how to cast his actors. that I don’t want to be accused Audio: But you still haven’t explained of pre-empting criticism and to me:What is theatre? then blocking it. Artist: Oooff… theatre. It’s difficult. Audio: We all know that Lina Saneh, Where do I start? It’s such a after she completed her studies broad term. at the Lebanese University, went Audio: No – I mean theatre in to Europe to continue her acting Lebanon.You’ve been following career.You went to workshops: Lebanese theatre from its incep- Far East, Commedia dell’Arte, tion until today.You’ve watched Jacques Le Coq, Arianne many plays. And, you’ve read a Mnouchkine… but, we’re not lot about them… seeing you.You’re nowhere to be Artist: Listen… I’m going to tell seen.You’re not taking on any you about this dream that I roles.Why? had… I dreamt that I was wan- Artist: But I’m here now. I’m acting dering in the streets, going from now. office to office… to get a Audio: No. I mean acting a role – a license to exhume my tomb. role – not like this. Audio: Sorry? Artist: But, I am playing a role. Artist: My tomb, my grave… I went Audio: No. No. Sorry.What I to over a hundred offices.They mean… what you’re doing, any- all refused. So, I decided to one can do. It doesn’t need four exhume it myself. After a lot of years of studying. effort, I was able to reach my Artist: You’re right. coffin. But when I opened the lid, Audio: So, why aren’t you acting… I didn’t find my corpse. Instead, I really acting? found my father’s. It took a lot Artist: Honestly, I’m getting offered for me to interpret this dream. a lot of roles… but I’m not Audio: What are you trying to interested in any of them. imply… that Lebanese theatre is Audio: What are you trying to tell a beast? me? There aren’t any good Artist: No! What does Lebanese directors in town? theatre have to do with this? I Artist: Maybe there are a lot of was really trying to tell you good ones, but none of them

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satisfies me… I mean… I don’t price of a ticket… not to see an feel any of them can direct actor playing a part anyone can actors the way I like… the way I do… I think they deserve to see want to act… talent, skill, creativity, ingenuity… Audio: So what you’re trying to say Artist: But, in reality, they aren’t is that right now you’re not paying enough. Let them pay, acting? and we’ll show them whatever Artist: Yes, but… they want to see.We’ll sing, we’ll Audio: So then, any director can dance, we’ll emote, we’ll direct you. express, we’ll cry, we’ll jump Artist: If I’m playing a character… around like chimpanzees, we’ll Audio: Then, you’re not playing a go ape-shit for them. character now? Audio: Really?? If they pay enough, Artist: Are you trying to trip me up? you would do anything they ask Audio: No, I’m not trying to trip for? you up, but… we just want to Artist: What do you think I am, a know why you aren’t acting. slut? Artist: I’m acting. I’m acting. Audio: You’re confrontational… Audio: But what you’re doing now, you’re a confrontational person… anyone can do. Artist: Me?! Artist: You’re right. Audio: Yes… all your talk is Audio: Ok. Ok. If there aren’t any provocative. Actually, when I directors to your liking… Your think about your work, it resem- husband… why doesn’t he pro- bles your talk… provocative… duce anything for you? confrontational… Artist: He doesn’t feel like it. Artist: How… How did you get all Audio: Speak into the microphone. of that? Artist: He doesn’t feel like it. Audio: You’re like a commando.You Audio: What? do these small works.You pres- Artist: Once, by chance, I read a ent them once or twice… an line to him… I can’t remember instant.Then, for six months, a by whom… something to the year… or two… you just talk effect of:‘It’s enough that some- about them. one does something… anything’. Artist: What’s wrong with that? For example, someone passing Audio: Nothing. But it reminds me by – crossing the street, while of the tactics used by the Islamic another person is watching.This Resistance and the military act, in itself, is enough to be the- operations they carry out atre. He found this pleasing. against enemy positions. He was convinced. Since then, Artist: Whoa, whoa… where did he has decided that we shouldn’t that connection come from?! bother putting in all this effort, Audio: It’s the same logic: Conquer, all this energy, sweat and guts raise the flag, film the event, into theatre when it’s actually withdraw. so simple. Artist: Wait a minute… just a Audio: But there’s an audience as minute, this is the enemy’s point well. I mean… they’re paying the of view. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 129

Audio: No, this is the point of view that we’re Arabs until the of the audience. Americans and the Israelis bomb Artist: Anyway, I have no presence Beirut, the West Bank or Iraq… in without an audience. In my par- times of crises… It’s only when ticular case, things don’t happen things like this happen that this this way.The difference between instinct in us is stirred. Our loyalty my work and the Islamic is instinctive; therefore, it’s not Resistance is that when the positive. In this context, the Arab Resistance films its operations, it’s identity can be considered an to prove their existence. issue or matter, which in itself, Because, in their opinion, one imposes upon us the inevitability can’t be real unless one’s cap- of fate and destiny. tured on film. Otherwise, why would they film their operations? Pause When I use my image, it isn’t to prove my existence… on the Audio: So, what are you reading contrary, it’s to confirm my death these days? or, maybe, to say that the per- Artist: Newspapers. formance taking place before you Audio: What newspapers? is not actually happening.

Long pause

Artist: Do you think I’m being irrational? Audio: No. No. Not at all.What you’re saying is very profound and interesting. And it confirms my opinion about you and your work. Artist: What opinion? Audio: That you’re confrontational… a provocative woman. Artist: You’re still thinking with the logic of the enemy.The enemy thinks that our work is provocative.They accuse us of being influenced by the West. Of being cerebral. Formalist.There’s no story there… no actors… we have suffered and are still suffering from the hegemonisation of the Arab and Islamic identity. But, in reality, people are not at all proud of this identity.This is our reality; and, what I did was to attempt to tell this truth.We don’t remember

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Artist: By virtue of my work, I get know? In the play, you say you like all the newspapers. homosexuals because they are Audio: What work? incapable of being soldiers. Artist: I teach at the university. Artist: This is discriminatory Audio: Move closer to the micro- language and I would never phone, then speak into it. speak this way. Artist: I teach at the university. Audio: Are you denying your sym- Audio: Which pages of the news- pathetic language with regard to paper do you read? homosexuality in the play? Artist: The first and the second. Artist: No. Audio: You mean you’re interested Audio: Speak into the microphone. in politics? Artist: No. Artist: Yes. Audio: Are you denying your Audio: Do you have political opposition to the military in ambitions? your play? Artist: I have no political ambitions. Artist: No. Audio: Speak into the microphone. Audio: Was this statement censored Artist: I have no political ambitions. out of your play? Yes or no? I’m only interested in theatre. Artist: Yes. Audio: Does political theatre con- Audio: Speak into the microphone. cern you? Artist: Yes. It was censored. Artist: I support the arts. I don’t Audio: And despite all this, you did know when it’s the arts… when not comply with that order. it’s politics… Artist: Yes, I did. Audio: The title of your play – Audio. No, you didn’t. Biokhraphia? Artist: You said it, not me. Artist: Yes.Yes. Audio: Me? Audio: What’s the play about? Artist: Yes, you. What does it talk about? Audio: Are you trying to get the bet- Artist: About… ter of me? Stop beating around Audio: Wait… what about the the bush… confess your failure. title? Artist: What failure? Artist: Biokhraphia is made up of Audio: Confess to us that you no three words: Bio from bios, longer know how to do theatre. which means life. Khara, which in Artist: That’s the least of my Arabic means ‘shit’. And, Phia… concerns. in Arabic means ‘in it’. So; it’s a Audio: … that you don’t know shitty biography. how to act. Audio: Indeed. So what’s the play Artist: Who gives a shit? about? Audio: … that you don’t know Artist: The play… I enter. I have a how, or where, to even begin tape recorder with me. I press with theatre.You don’t know ‘PLAY’. My voice comes out. It where you’re going.What you starts asking me…. want to say.What… Audio: Yeah,Yeah… we’ve been through this… what are you Artist stops the tape recorder. doing?… telling me what I already Exits. Returns after a long pause. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 131

Artist presses ‘PLAY’. Artist: Biokhraphia is made up of three words: Bio from bios, Audio: Look. Don’t do that again. which means life. Khara, which in Understood? Arabic means ‘shit’. And, Phia… Artist: I apologise. in Arabic means ‘in it’. So, it’s a Audio: Let’s go back to the last part. shitty biography. Artist: Ok. Audio: Press ‘REWIND’. Artist moves to a chair stage left. Her image appears in the screen Artist rewinds tape… Presses that the artist was physically ‘STOP’… Presses the ‘PLAY’ button. standing behind before (video projection of the artist takes the Audio: So, what are you reading place of the artist). these days? Artist: Newspapers. Audio: Indeed. So what’s the play Audio: What newspapers? about? Artist: By virtue of my work, I get Artist: The play… I enter. I have a all the newspapers. tape recorder with me. I press Audio: What work? ‘PLAY’. My voice comes out. It Artist: I teach at the university. starts asking me…. Audio: Move closer to the micro- Audio: Yeah,Yeah… we’ve been phone, then speak. through this… what are you Artist: I teach at the university. doing?… telling me what I already Audio: Which pages of the news- know? In the play, you say you like paper do you read? homosexuals because they are Artist: The first and the second. incapable of being soldiers. Audio: You mean you’re interested Artist: This is discriminatory lan- in politics? guage and I would never speak Artist: Yes. this way. Audio: Do you have political ambi- Audio: Are you denying your sym- tions? pathetic language with regard to Artist: I have no political ambitions. homosexuality in the play? Audio: Speak into the microphone. Artist: No. Artist: I have no political ambitions. Audio: Speak into the microphone. I’m only interested in theatre. Artist: No. Audio: Does political theatre Audio: Are you denying your oppo- concern you? sition to the military in your play? Artist: I support the arts. I don’t Artist: No. know when it’s the arts… when Audio: Was this statement censored it’s politics… out of your play? Yes or no? Audio: The title of your play – Artist: Yes. Biokhraphia? Audio: Speak into the microphone. Artist: Yes.Yes. Artist: Yes. It was censored. Audio: What’s the play about? Audio: And despite all this, you did What does it talk about? not comply with that order. Artist: About… Artist: Yes, I did. Audio: Wait… what about the title? Audio: No, you didn’t.

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Artist: You said it, not me. Audio: There are many other sub- Audio: Me? jects you can talk about. Artist: Yes, you. Video: Like what? Audio: Are you trying to get the Audio: You can talk about inheri- better of me? tance… love… about war, and Video: But there’s a scene I didn’t how ugly it is… A lot of things. present in compliance with the Video: Can we talk about Syria? censorship order. Audio: What do you mean by that? Audio: Which scene? Of course not. But you can talk Video: The one at the beginning. about Israel. The actress enters… she Video: Yeah, and what do we say… squats… she shits a tape… she that Israel is our enemy? Tell me shoves it into the tape something we don’t know. recorder… and plays it. Audio: This country is full of conflict Audio: Ooff… so vulgar… you’re and the censors are here to incredible… you think this is protect you. At the same time, daring? That you’re provoking the they are giving you a margin of audience? We should thank the freedom within which to work. censors for stopping you from But, it’s limited by some broad doing these things… You… you red lines. And, as the Americans don’t think about what your would say,“the devil lies in the father would say if he saw you details”.Therefore, take my doing these things? Your moth- advice and don’t get into details. er?? Your in-laws??? Your students? Keep busy with the generalities. Video: If we can’t talk about sex… or about the military… or about The video projection of the artist religion… or the presidency, shoots herself in the head with a what are we supposed to talk pistol.The actress gets up quickly about in theatre? from the chair and returns to the set. She runs to both the tape and video recorders. She presses ‘REWIND’… ‘STOP’… then, ‘PLAY’.

Audio: This country is full of conflict and the censors are here to protect you. At the same time, they are giving you a margin of freedom within which to work. But, it’s limited by some broad red lines. And as the Americans would say,“the devil lies in the details”.Therefore, take my advice and don’t get into details. Keep busy with the generalities. Video: Ok. Audio: How often do you sleep 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 133

with your husband? times, the positions, whether I Video: Do you want the details or enjoyed it or not. On our tenth do you want me to keep busy wedding anniversary, I did an with the generalities? inventory and put it on paper. Audio: Don’t be impertinent. I’m Would you like me to read it to asking you a very clear question. you? Video: Sorry, go ahead. Artist: That’s not necessary… Audio: How often do you sleep Audio: Of course it is. with your husband? Video: In the last ten years, we slept Video: That’s none of your business… together 1,143 times. 231 times Audio: When was the last time you during the day. 912 at night. On slept with him? the bed, 822. In the living room, Video: That’s none of your business… 285. 11 times in the bathroom. In Audio: Do you enjoy it? the stairwell, 8 times. 3 failed Video: That’s none of your business… attempts in the elevator. 41 Audio: Was he your first? times during trips outside of Video: That’s personal. Lebanon. As for positions:There Audio: Did you have other sexual are 3 fundamental positions… experiences? Audio: That’s ok… that’s ok… Video: That’s none of your business… what concerns me is whether Audio: Do you masturbate? or not you enjoyed it. Video: You don’t have the right to Video: Oh.This is a subject I have ask these kind of questions. calculated in detail. I found that Audio: Do you use condoms? in the first year and in the last Video: I said that’s none of your year, we slept together the same business. amount of times… 92 times. 92 Audio: Do you keep your eyes means 23 times each season. open or closed? But, this can’t be right… Video: That’s none of your business… because according to my note- Audio: Do you guys make noises? book, in the first three months, Video: That’s none of your business… we only slept together three Audio: Do you guys talk? times. I think maybe because it Video: That’s none of your business… was cold? In the next three Audio: Do you watch porn? months, 15 times.The next sea- Video: That’s none of your busi- son, 52. So it was mounting. In ness… none of your business!!… the last three months, 22 times. none of your business!!!… That means that, if we wanted Audio: Ok, Ok, Ok… All right. How to take the median average, we many times a week? have to take the second and last Video: Honestly, ever since I got season, because the difference married… isn’t so big. So, if we take the Audio: Speak to the microphone. median average for three Video: Ever since I got married, I’ve months, it comes out to 18.5 been recording in a little note- times.That means that during book how many times we sleep the week, we used to sleep with together, my husband and I:The each other 1.42 times.That date, the time, the number of means 0.20 times per day.

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Which is also not correct, Because we’re at a dead-end?? because, according to my note- That’s nonsense and it’s ridicu- book, we only slept with each lous. I’ve heard a lot of talk other on weekends.That means about our generation falling we have to divide the number apart. I even heard that our gen- by two to get what the average eration would fall apart in is per day.Which is 0.71. 0.71 is January, to be exact.What hap- 0.29 less than what is required pened?? We’re already into April for me to orgasm. So, it’s safe and our generation still hasn’t for us to say that in the first fallen apart.There are people year and in the tenth year, my who are putting up money… is sexlife was a failure. On the it reasonable to say that people other hand, the fourth year has are putting money into a place the best ratios, 1.16, which, in where they have no faith? I’m practical terms, means we were going to be even more honest. enjoying it by 0.16 more than We, last month, asked for required. And this number was $400,000 from international the cause of my ailments. associations that I’m not going to Because, it’s true that we were name.They gave us $840,000.In enjoying one full time, but there reality, we took $750,000. So that was 0.16 that was never com- we don’t beat around the bush, pleted.Which was the main let’s put it this way:We asked for source of my frustration. $400,000 and they gave us Artist: This isn’t true… what are $750,000.We, as a generation, you talking about?? find it imperative to confirm… Audio: Frustration! That’s exactly what I wanted to get at! Do you The artist pauses both tape and think that this is your genera- video players. tion’s problem? She opens the faucets, attached to Video: I think so.Yes… I think so. the bottom of the screen, and Audio: Then, this is what you think drains her liquid image from the caused your generation to reach screen into small bottles. Each bot- a dead-end? tle has the same image of the Video: Not at all. My generation artist that was on the screen. She hasn’t reached a dead-end. puts these small bottles on a tray. Audio: But there’s a feeling out there Walks up the theatre aisle towards that your generation is bankrupt. the exist. Sits at a table. They have nothing to say. She places a sign on the table and Video: I’m going to tell you some- waits for the audience to get up. thing. If you heard about an The sign says ‘For Sale: $20/Bottle’. institution on the brink of bank- ruptcy, would you put your THE END money in it or would you take it out? There are huge institutions that are supporting us.They’re giving us funds to do theatre. Why do you think that is? 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 135

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Ode to Rhinos

Nadine R. L.Touma

Nadine Touma,born in 1972, received a BA in Women Studies and Studio Art at Wellesley College. Projects she worked on include: Exhibiting in the Hamra Street Project, Ashkal Alwan, Beirut, 2000, Missing Links,Ashkal Alwan, Cairo, 2001 at Townhouse gallery. She co-directed with Elie Karam and scenographed Ta’a Kul Mjaddara Ya Sabi, Ayloul Festival, 1999; and directed, wrote and scenographed Hawa Ab,Ayloul Festival, 1998. In collaboration with Elie Karam,Touma presented an installation, Revisiting the Human Rights Charter, Espace SD, Beirut, 1998.

An Introduction To What Comes After Sandouq El Ferjeh is a street performance based on a year of field research on rhinoplasty practices in Lebanon, interviews with seven plastic surgeons and fifty-five female patients, investigating the ‘how’ and the ‘why’ the region has been witnessing, in the last four years, this extensive widespread phenomenon. Elements of the performance: • 1001 handmade Marzipan noses made from almond paste, sugar and orange blossom water, representing four stereotypical nose shapes: African, Native American, Semitic, and Marilyn Monroe. • A vegetable seller’s pickup truck, Sousou the Coquette, equipped with a megaphone. • A Sandouq El Ferjeh (inspired by the old-fashioned peeping boxes), containing a series of images consisting of pictures which documents the nose-making process, aged pictures of Egyptian female film stars stitched with needle and thread, illustrations of sindibad from old European children’s books, handmade replicas of famous oil paintings and images from an old sandouq (box) from Aleppo, Syria. • A bumper sticker saying: Handle With Care NOSE Thank You. • The artist and three female performers peddling noses. The noses were hung in plexiglass, fluorescent boxes installed in the back of the pick-up, Sousou the Coquette, which toured Beirut while the artist announced on a megaphone, in humourous rhymes, the great wonders of the noses, their tastes and shapes, inciting people to fight the monolithic Lebanese nose – with all its political and social implications – and much more. Sousou the Coquette made several stops at various locations in the city of Beirut: Noses were sold and stories of lost noses told, people in the streets peeped at the images showed and ate noses with mouths opened and closed.

The following texts were created a few months after the street performance.They are reflections on rhinoplasty practices and on-going adventures through nose stories. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 137

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Adolescent Voluminous Pencil Drawings I turned off my bedroom lights touching myself with eyes closed feeling every curve every inch the holes the bone the arch the fleshy parts the wetness inside the width the length.Ten of age, my adolescent nose growing at a rate of a kilometre a minute, crossing a mirror happened at a disproportionate ratio of time/reflection. I drew the shadow of my profile day after day, erased black pencil marks on the same white wall marking my rate, (3+6=9+3=12+3=15+…) measur- ing the difference, no it was not a nose drawing distorted by light but a shadow that said it all:The kids staring at me at school, the teacher not looking in my eyes but at my nose, my parents asking me if I was ok, my dog fixated on licking my new additive volume and my com- pulsive panic reaction of,“Oh my god I cannot read or write anymore because my nose is blocking my vision.” I turned the lights on rushed to my parents’ room screaming and crying,“I don’t want my nose.” A family joke arose from the adolescent nose drama that my dad used on me to try and exor- cise my agony, he would call me from across the room and when I would answer or turn to face him he would say,“Ouch! You just hit me with your nose!” And so began my nose phantas- magoric obsessions observations obliterations. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 139

Mouwahhidat Years later, many love-hate stories apart, millions of nose files rushing through my mind, a fetish of sucking my lovers’ noses, wars and colonial mandates beginning and ending, a post-Picot era of unrest, many travels between East and West and very few between North and South, a post-, then pre-Shaarawi Ottoman unveiling in Egypt, and an endless non-ending end of Arab Nationalism, emerged in the Levantine area a new social party with political implications called MOUWAHHIDAT: Women Oneness With Rhinos. Noses of all shapes and colours were being sacrificed to the goddesses above, eliminating difference, celebrating oneness… finally the East and the West were bridged where the Western nose sat on the Eastern face all boundaries erased and Saids’ Orientalism thrown into a cleansing ritualistic bonfire. Rich and poor, Christians Muslims Jews and atheists, leftists centrists and rightists, all seeking to be different from one another yet one with the Rhinos. Drawings by Hayla The Mouwahhidat grew larger changing experiences, autographed and larger, attracting more and photographs of new noses, audio more people, organising charity tapes with his favourite Rhinoplasty balls for women who did not have recipes (one of my personal the money but wanted to join, with favourites was one doctor who slogans like:“Your Life or Your would not only change your nose Nose”“Free from Nose Testing”, but also your facial expression by “Pacifist Rhinoplasty”,“Love adding an eternal smile, or frown, Yourself, Get Rid of Your Nose”, depending on what the “Nose on Credit, 5% Interest” Mouwahhidat needed to look more Etcetera… Etcetera… Etcetera… beautiful than ever and more like A male plastic surgeon was cho- each other.) sen every year as the new pop idol As a gift (and we thank them for of the Mouwahhidat. Posters and T- it), the generous Mouwahhidat have shirts donning his pictures were offered us a Stitch Your Own Nose printed, interviews on all televisions, card with a needle and blue thread. videotapes of his Mouwahhidat Enjoy drawing your own blue-line success stories and Rhinoplasty's’ life- Rhino boundaries.

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Rhinoanarchy At dusk in a remote village on a faraway mountain in a tiny stone house under an unknown Roman bridge in a dark room smelling of wet spring grass, met for the first time a group of Rhinoanarchists, rebelling against the Mouwahhidat, fighting the Rhino-globalisation movement and the fast-Rhino-clinic- chains springing out everywhere, discussing Rhinos at large, Derridas’ epistemology and extensive work on the source of the word ‘nose’, Foucaults’ nose in criminology essays and the usage of nose torture in prisons, the loss of many Southern and Eastern archetypal noses and Naccaches’ work on the Babylonians’ adoration of the ‘long nose’. One of their first activities was to invite a group of multicultural politically-correct Rhinos to the Levant, to reintroduce them slowly into their communities of origin without wreaking culture shock on the indigenous masses and take them sightseeing.The Rhinoanarchists were kind enough to provide us with some photographs documenting the journey of the Rhinos. 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 141

Rhinophobia Rhinophobia, – as found in the American Medical Encyclopedia – is defined as a sickness that appeared in the Western Hemisphere and the North American Continent during September 2001 after Christ and post 9/11. Its manifestations include the following reactions at the sight of a Levantine nose: Hyperventilation, severe chronic malfunction of the bladder, a twitching of the upper lip accompanied by a deep unquenchable desire for sex. A cure has yet to be found – but the American Congress has just passed a bill allocating millions of dollars for medical research.

A Conclusion To What Will Come Later After what we hope has been an extensive overview of the current Rhino situation worldwide, we hope to see your com- ments and hear your nose stories on rhinoleb@hotmail, the official address for Rhinos.

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EXHIBITS

The Crows, Bita Fayyazi Copyright, Khalil Rabah Being there…, Randa Shaath 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 144

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145 á≤£æŸG ‘ á«aÉ≤ãdG äÉ°SQÉªŸG øY ióàæe :á«∏NGO ∫É¨°TCG 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 145

The Crows

Bita Fayyazi

Bita Fayyazi is an Iranian artist with a 13-year work experience in ceramics and sculpture. She has exhibited in Iran and internationally, in Copenhagen, London, Sweden and New Delhi.

If men had wings and bore black feathers, few of them would be clever enough to be crows, Henry Ward Beecher

Fayyazi first began working with the figure of the crow in Experiment 98, an exhibition of ephemeral art in an old and abandoned house marked for demolition.With three other artists, she ventured into reconfiguring that space and its history. Bita’s contribution was a large number of sculpted crows placed on top of used fruit crates. All the work was subsequently destroyed along with the house. Encounters with crows have been a common occurrence for Fayyazi. Although she feels many would consider this situation as sin- ister or as a bad omen; for her, this occurrence is filled with humour, folly and even irony.The crow, for Bita, is a fascinating presence and deeply resonating.

The common crow is really an uncommon bird, Raispuram Krishnaswami Laxman, Cartoonist

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Khalil Rabah

Khalil Rabah has exhibited in Germany, Cairo, Paris and Belgium; in addition to an ongoing engagement with Gallery Anadiel, in Jerusalem. He has also participated in several Biennales, including the 11th Biennale of Sydney, the XXIV Biennale of Sao Paulo and the Kwangju Biennale in South Korea.

As a result of recent historical events, contemporary Palestinian identity has become an amalgam of numerous cultures to which Palestinians have been voluntarily and/or forcibly, exposed. A new Palestinian cultural identity is being forged, based on the complex processes of one culture feeding off another, an experience which involves loss, pain and violation, but also the possibility for a transformation. It is these processes and dynamics, which can be seen in the work of Rabah, such as in Tattoo (1997), where the unweaving of the pattern of the ‘kaffiyeh’ delineates an absent screen that traces the memory marking the relationship between the thread and the fabric. In his Half Self-Portrait (1997), the medical plaster covering parts of the artist’s face forms a cocoon, or an epidermal layer, that does not harden into a crust. Khalil Rabah’s intervention at the Home Works Forum, in Beirut, was entitled Copyright.

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á©eÉ÷G øe IRÉ› .1963 ,á«cÒe’G IóëàŸG äÉj’ƒdG ‘ äódh ,á«æ«£°ù∏a IQƒ°üeq å©°T GófQ á©eÉL øe ,ájô°ûÑdG ä’É°üJ’G Ωƒ∏Y ‘ Òà°ù«LÉe .á«£°ShCG ¥ô°ûdG äÉ°SGQódG - IôgÉ≤dG ‘ á«cÒeC’G ‘ ôjƒ°üàdG º°ùb ‘ â∏ªY .IôgÉ≤dG ‘ kÉ«dÉM ¢û«©Jh ,1977-1969 ,ähÒH ‘ â°TÉY .ÉJƒ°ù«æ«e òæe á«YƒÑ°SC’G ΩGôgC’G IójôL ‘ IQƒ°üe .1994 ΩÉ©dG ‘ ,IõZh ô°üe ‘ á«°ùfôØdG áaÉë°üdG ádÉch .1993 ΩÉY

øe IÉ≤à°ùe á«aGôZƒJƒa Qƒ°U ¢Vô©e øeh ,áHƒædG OÓHh Ú£°ù∏a ‘ IóY ™jQÉ°ûe .á«°ùæŸG ÉgQõLh IôgÉ≤dG ‘ á«eƒ«dG IÉ«◊G ∫h’GC »≤«KƒàdG É¡Yhô°ûe QhòL Oƒ©J ƒgh ,Góæc º«ﬂ ‘ äGóHC .1988 ΩÉ©dG ¤EG ,ô°üe ‘ Ú«æ«£°ù∏ØdG ÚÄLÓd ó«MƒdG º«ıG ,áæ°S ¬«a â°†eGC .IõZ ™e Ohó◊G ≈∏Y ™≤jh ⁄ »àdG áæμe’GC ¤GE ÉghOƒ≤j ¿GC ÚÄLÓd kácQÉJ ≈∏Y Égƒ©∏£j ¿GhC πÑb øe É¡JQƒ°U ób øμJ .º¡JÉ«M ‘ áª¡eh á«°SÉ°SGC ÖfGƒL :á∏FÉb ,É¡àHôŒ øY å©°T GófQ çqóëàJ ≈∏Y õcQGhC .ºgQóbGhC º¡ÑMGC øjòdG Qƒ°UG{C É˘˘¡˘˘«˘˘a ∑Î°ûj »˘˘à˘˘dG á˘˘«˘˘eƒ˘˘«˘˘˘dG IÉ˘˘˘«◊G ô˘˘˘°UÉ˘˘˘æ˘˘˘Y »àdG AÉ«°T’GC ∂∏J øY åëHGC .kÉ©«ªL ô°ûÑdG AÉ˘˘˘˘˘≤˘˘˘˘˘Ñ˘˘˘˘˘dG ‘ º˘˘˘˘˘¡˘˘˘˘˘bô˘˘˘˘˘W ∞˘˘˘˘˘°ûμ˘˘˘˘˘à˘˘˘˘˘°SGhC É˘˘˘˘˘˘æ˘˘˘˘˘˘©˘˘˘˘˘˘ªŒ »àdG º¡à«fÉ°ùfGE ≈∏Y á¶aÉÙG äÉ«é«JGÎ°SGh .áHƒ©°üdG á¨dÉH ±hôX ‘ ,kÉÑdÉZ ,ºàJ

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Being there…

Randa Shaath

Randa Shaath is a Palestinian, born in the United States in 1963. She received a BA in Middle Eastern Studies from the American University in Cairo, and an MA in Visual Mass Communication from the University of Minnesota. She lived in Beirut from 1969 until 1977. Currently, she resides in Cairo, Egypt. She worked as a photo stringer for AFP in Egypt and Gaza, in 1994, and has worked as a photographer for the Al Ahram Weekly Newspaper since 1993.

Shaath’s exhibit portrayed photographs from various projects she had worked on in Palestine, Nubian villages and the forgotten islands of Cairo’s daily life. Her first documentary project dates back to 1988 in Canada Camp, the only Palestinian refugee camp in Egypt, bordering Gaza. She spent a year living in the camp, allowing refugees to guide her to places that she had not photographed, and where they pointed out the more important aspects of their lives. Photographing those she admired, she focused on elements of everyday life, elements that everyone finds in common.Through her photographs, she explored the ways in which people survive and the strategies they adopt to preserve their humanity, often under extreme circumstances.

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¢VQÉ©e

FILMS

Al Mumiaa - The Days of Counting the Years, Shadi Abdel Salam Tahadi, Nizar Hassan Zinat:A Special Day, Ibrahim Mokhtari Baalbeck, Ghassan Salhab, Mohammad Soueid, Akram Zaatari The Arab Dream - Homage by Assassination - Cyber Palestine, Elia Suleiman The Sleep of Reason:This Blood Spilled in My Veins, Jalal Toufic 00-HW book EN ed Flash+ 9/28/09 7:03 PM Page 152

AÉ«eƒŸG Al Mumiaa The Days of Counting Úæ°ùdG ≈°ü– ¿GC Ωƒj the Years

ΩÓ°ùdG óÑY …OÉ°T Shadi Abdel Salam

á∏«Ñb º«YR ¬«HCG äƒe ó©H ,ôμÑdG √ƒNCGh ¢ù«fh ∞°ûàμj After the death of his father, the chief of the ±ƒ˘¡˘˘c ¢ûÑ˘˘f ≈˘˘∏˘˘Y ¿ƒ˘˘°û«˘˘©˘˘j Gƒ˘˘fÉ˘˘c ¬˘˘à˘˘∏˘˘«˘˘Ñ˘˘b π˘˘gCG ¿CG ,äÉ˘˘Hô◊G Horabat Tribe,Wanis, and his elder brother discover ∫É«àZG ºàj .É¡©«Hh É¡«a áfƒaóŸG äGAÉ«eƒŸG êGôîà°SGh ,πÑ÷G that the tribe has been living off stealing mummies √òg ¿CG ,¬∏ªY AÉæKCG ,∞°ûàμ«d á∏«Ñ≤dG ¢ù«fh ºYõàjh ,ôμÑdG ñC’G and their belongings from inside the mountain. Following the assassination of his brother,Wanis, ≈Jƒe åãL Oô› â°ù«d ,É¡fƒ©«Ñjh É¡fƒbô°ùj »àdG äGAÉ«eƒŸG now the chief of the tribe, comes to realise .√OGóLCG äÉaQ ÉjÉ≤H »g πH ,IóFÉH ¢Tƒ≤f hCG Údƒ¡› through his interactions with an archeological 1969 ,á≤«bO 90 ,º∏e 35 º∏«a mission to Thebes that what surrounded him were, in fact, the remains of his ancestors and not mere dead objects or inscriptions. It is a film about memory and consciousness. Film 35mm, 90 minutes, 1969

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…ó–q Tahadi

ø°ùM QGõf Nizar Hassan

óªﬁ πØ£dG øY ,á°VÉØàfE’G øY º∏«a áYÉæ°üH êôﬂ ∞q∏nμoj In Tahadi, a filmmaker is commissioned to do a ±hôX §°Sh ¬°ùØf πª©dG ≥jôa óéj ICÉéah .kGójó– IQódG film about the Intifada, based on the footage of the .á˘∏˘FÉ˘g ∑QÉ˘©˘eh ∫ƒŒq ™˘æ˘e ,á˘∏˘˘Ø˘˘≤˘˘e äÉ˘˘bô˘˘W :á˘˘Hƒ˘˘©˘˘°üdG á˘˘¨˘˘dÉ˘˘H lethal shooting of young Mohammed El Durra. He ¿Éμe øe ∫É≤àf’G øY kGõLÉY ¬°ùØf πª©dG ≥jôa óéj Ée ¿ÉYô°Sh quickly finds himself in the midst of a mad attempt at making a film in impossible conditions: Road clo- .IõZ øe ¬∏dG ΩGQ ¤EG ÜôbCG ÉHhQhCG íÑ°üJh ,ôNBG ¤EG sures, curfews and terrible combat. It soon 2001 ,á≤«bO 20 ,º∏e 35 º∏«a becomes quite impossible for the film crew to move from one place to another, and Europe seems to be closer to Ramallah than Gaza. Film 35mm, 20 minutes, 2001

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…OÉY ÒZ Ωƒj äÉæjR IÉ«M ‘ Zinat: A Special Day

…QÉàﬂ º«gGôHG Ibrahim Mokhtari áë°üdG ∫É› ‘ á£°TÉfh IôYÉ°T .Iõ«‡ á«°üî°T äÉæjR É¡∏°UCG .Ωƒª©dG ¢ù∏› ‘ kGƒ°†Yh kÉeCG É¡fƒc øY kÓ°†a ,áeÉ©dG ICGô˘˘˘eG ∫hCG âfÉ˘˘˘ch .»˘˘˘°SQÉ˘˘˘Ø˘˘˘dG è˘˘˘«˘˘˘∏ÿG ‘ Iô˘˘˘jõ˘˘˘L ,rº˘˘˘˘°û˘˘˘˘cp ø˘˘˘˘e ‘ 1985 ΩÉ©dG πª©dG ∫É› ‘ äCGóH ÉeóæY ,É¡¡Lh øY äôØ°SCG øe áæjRO øe ÌcCG ¢ù«°SCÉJ ‘ ,É¡∏ªY ∫ÓN øe ,âªgÉ°S .É¡àjôb äÉ«°üî°ûdG ióMEG Ωƒ«dG »gh .á«FÉf ≥WÉæe ‘ á«ë°üdG õcGôŸG ,íÑ°üàd ,1999 äÉHÉîàfG ‘ äRÉa å«M ,º°ûc ‘ á«Ñ©°T ÌcC’G Zinat, an outstanding figure – poet, health work- .Ωƒª©dG ¢ù∏› πNóJ ICGôeG ∫hCG ,∂dòH er, mother and council member – from Qeshm, an 2000 ,á≤«bO 56 ,»≤FÉKh º∏«a island in the Persian Gulf, was the first woman to unveil her face upon starting her activities in 1985. Her work helped establish more than a dozen health centres in remote areas. She is, today, one of the most popular public figures in Qeshm, where she won the 1999 elections and became the first female council-member. Video Documentary, 56 minutes, 2000

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∂Ñ∏©H Baalbeck

Ö¡∏°S ¿É°ùZ Ghassan Salhab ójƒ°S óªﬁ Mohammad Soueid …ÎYõdG ΩôcCG Akram Zaatari

,…ô˘î˘a ìÉ˘˘Ñ˘˘°üd á˘˘∏˘˘Ø˘˘M á˘˘«˘˘£˘˘¨˘˘à˘˘d Qƒ˘˘°üeh ‘É˘˘ë˘˘°U êô˘˘î˘˘j A journalist and a photographer drift between Éª¡à∏MQ QôμàJh ,∂Ñ∏©Hh ähÒH ÚH Éª¡≤jôW ¿Ó°†j Éª¡æμd Beirut and Baalbeck.This journey is repeated three .¬°ùLGƒgh øWƒdG ΩÓMCG ¢ùμ©àd ,äGôe çÓK times, in three different ways, evoking parallels to current issues and the confusion in Lebanon’s 2001 ,á≤«bO 60 ,ƒjó«a present state. Video, 60 minutes, 2001

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¿Éª«∏°S É«∏jEG Elia Suleiman

êQóæjh ¬∏dG ΩGQh Iô°UÉædGh ¢Só≤dG ‘ §jô°ûdG Gòg Qƒ°Uq Filmed on location in Jerusalem, Nazareth and Ωó≤j .á«aÉ≤ãdG »JQBG IÉæb êÉàfEG øe zá«ØdC’G ájÉ¡f{ á∏°ù∏°S ‘ Ramallah, The Arab Dream was commissioned by ®ÉØë∏d »°üî°ûdG ¬YGô°U ∫ƒM ¬JÓeCÉJ Gòg ¬£jô°T ‘ êôıG Arté TV as part of the End of the Millennium series. ,πeC’G ¬«a ∫AÉ°†àj π≤M ‘ É¡æY ´ÉaódGh ,á«dÉªL áë°ùa ≈∏Y In this film, Elia Suleiman meditates on his own struggle to safeguard an aesthetic territory in a site .¬JÉ«eƒj äÉ«W á«°TÉØdG áYõædG øμ°ùJh where hope is diminishing and a fascistic spirit is 1998 ,á≤«bO 26 ,ƒjó«a haunting the everyday. Video, 26 minutes, 1998

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Homage by πà≤dÉH ËôμJ Assassination

¿Éª«∏°S É«∏jEG Elia Suleiman

‘ º˘˘«˘˘≤˘˘e »˘˘æ˘˘«˘˘£˘˘°ù∏˘˘a ƒ˘˘gh ¢S .EG á˘˘˘«˘˘˘°üî˘˘˘°T º˘˘˘∏˘˘˘«˘˘˘Ø˘˘˘dG Ωó˘˘˘≤˘˘˘j Homage by Assassination depicts E.S., a ‘ .è«∏ÿG ÜôM ∫ÓN »FÉªæ«°S ¢üf áHÉàc ∫hÉëj ∑Qƒjƒ«f Palestinian who is writing a film script in New York ≥˘«˘°V ‘h ,»˘˘LQÉÿG ⁄É˘˘©˘˘dG ø˘˘Y ¬˘˘dGõ˘˘©˘˘fGh ,ó˘˘jGõ˘˘àŸG ¬˘˘YÉ˘˘£˘˘≤˘˘fG during the Gulf war, and his growing disconnected- kÉ°†bÉæàeh kGô°ùμe kÉ©bGh ø«©jh ∂°ùÁ ¿CG ¢S .EG ∫hÉëj ,¬£«ﬁ ness as he shuts himself off from the exterior q q world. In a claustrophobic environment, he .¬æWƒe ƒg ó«©H ¿Éμe ‘ QhóJ ÜôM øY attempts to capture, define and take control of his 1992 ,á≤«bO 28 ,º∏e 35 º∏«a fractured reality, a paradoxical reality of a war taking place, far away, at home. Film 35mm, 28 minutes, 1992

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Ú£°ù∏a ÈjÉ°S Cyber Palestine

¿Éª«∏°S É«∏jEG Elia Suleiman

∞˘˘°Sƒ˘˘jh Ëô˘˘e Ú«˘˘æ˘˘«˘˘£˘˘°ù∏˘˘Ø˘˘dG á˘˘°üb §˘˘jô˘˘°ûdG Gò˘˘g …hô˘˘j Cyber Palestine is the tale of a modern-day Mary ∫ÓàM’G â– É¡«a ¢û«©dG ÖYÉ°üeh ,IõZ ‘ ¢û«©∏d øjóFÉ©dG and Joseph, two Palestinian returnees living in Gaza, πØ– »eƒ«dG ´Gô°üdG OÓH ‘h IGQƒàdG ¢VQCG øe .»∏«FGô°SE’G and the hardships they face under the Israeli occu- êÉàfEG .á∏gòe äÉbQÉØÃ (Éjó«eƒμ«LGÎdG) IÉ¡∏ŸG - IÉ°SCÉŸG √òg pation. Coming from the land of the Bible, this tragi-comic tale has surprising revelations. á«ØdC’G ä’ÉØàMG øe AõL ƒgh ,z2000 º◊ â«H ´hô°ûe{ Cyber Palestine was commissioned by the .á«æ«£°ù∏ØdG á£∏°ùdG É¡«dEG âYnO »àdG áãdÉãdG Bethlehem 2000 Project of the Palestinian National 2000 ,á≤«bO 16 ,ƒjó«a Authority as part of the millennium commemorations. Video, 16 minutes, 2000

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≥«aƒJ ∫ÓL Jalal Toufic

äƒŸÉ˘˘˘H ká˘˘˘fQÉ˘˘˘˘≤˘˘˘˘e kÉ˘˘˘˘Ä˘˘˘˘«˘˘˘˘°T ¢ù«˘˘˘˘d ¿É˘˘˘˘°ùf’E …ƒ˘˘˘˘°†©˘˘˘˘dG äƒŸG ¿EG The organic dying of a human is as nothing com- IôgÉ¶dG .áYQÉ°üe áÑ∏M ‘ QƒK äƒÃ kÓã‡ ,¿Gƒ«◊ …ƒ°†©dG pared to that of an animal, exemplarily of a bull in a hCG áYQÉ°üe áÑ∏M ‘ mQƒK äƒe É¡JqóMp ‘ ´QÉ°†J »àdG Ió«MƒdG corrida; the only phenomenon that equals in intensity .È≤dG øe kÉLQÉN QRÉ©nd :¿É°ùfGE áeÉ«b »g ï∏°ùe ‘ Iô≤H äƒe the death of a bull in a corrida or of a cow in a slaughterhouse is the resurrection of a human, .ê øe ÖM á«æZG{C äƒ«dG .¢SGC .ä Ió«°üb ‘ áq«◊G IGôŸGC ≈≤∏f Lazarus coming out from the grave.The living ±OÉ˘˘°üJ ÚM ΩÉ˘˘æ˘˘à˘˘d É˘˘¡˘˘JOÉ˘˘°Sh …ƒ˘˘°ùJq »˘˘gh z∑hô˘˘ahô˘˘H Oô˘˘˘Ø˘˘˘dCG woman in T.S. Eliot’s The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock âfGC GPÉŸ ,ÇQÉ≤dG hGC ógÉ°ûŸG É¡qjCG IOÉ°SƒdG …ƒ°ùJq GPÉŸ .â«eÓdG is found settling her pillow to sleep when she ÈNG{Co ?¢üq∏ªàJ ¿GC ∫hÉ– ∞°ûcm …GC øe ?áLQódG √òg ¤G l¿É°ù©f encounters the undead.Why are you settling the pillow, why are you so sleepy? What disclosure are Gòg πª°ûj ’hCn G .äƒ«dGC Ió«°üb ‘ QRÉ©nd ∫ƒ≤j ,zA»°T sπc ™«ª÷G you thus trying to elude? “Tell you all,” Lazarus says in ?äƒŸG øY ¬°ùØf Èî«d QRÉ©nd OÉY πg ?¬°ùrØf QRÉ©nd zo™«ª÷G{ Eliot’s poem, and would that “all” not also include .∑GqPEG kÉªFÉf ¬°ùn rØf nónLhn CGn himself? Did Lazarus come back to tell himself about death? And did he find himself sleeping then? 2002 ,á≤«bO 32 ,ƒjó«a Video, 32 minutes, 2002

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