Congratulations to Emily Jacir. She won the Golden Lion at the 52nd Venice Biennale. Jacir's contribution to "Think with the Senses, Feel with the Mind," curated by Robert Storr, is titled "Material for a Film."
[Photo from Electronic Intifada. A part of Jacir's exhibit at the Venice Biennale, with a photo of Wael Zuaiter on the wall.]
She wrote about her project for Electronic Intifada in July. It's a sad and fascinating story of the Palestinian poet Wael Zuaiter and his assassination in Rome by Israeli agents in 1972. I gather that his story is depicted at least partially in the recent film Munich. Jacir's investigation into his life is poignant and direct. She interviewed people he knew, visited the apartment building where he lived and was shot 12 times, read letters and looked at the archives of his life.
When he was shot one bullet lodged in an old Arabic book of 1001 Nights, which he was translating into Italian. Jacir photographed all the pages that were marked by the bullet. She learned to fire a .22 caliber pistol, the gun the Mossad used to assassinate him, then shot 1,000 blank white books. These were put on display with the photos of the scarred 1001 Nights volume and other materials she gathered. I wish I could have seen the exhibit, but I was affected even just reading her account of the project. I recommend reading her short essay.
[Photo from Electronic Intifada. The photos of the bullet-scarred 1001 Nights, blank books shot by Jacir beyond.]
I wrote a short blurb (see below) about Jacir's work in 2005 for the book The Struggle for Sovereignty: Palestine and Israel, 1993-2005, edited by Joel Beinin and Rebecca Stein. [Incidentally, I was also responsible for finding and procuring the photographs for the book, including the cover.]
Emily Jacir poignantly distills the Palestinian experience of displacement into politically astute conceptual art. Living and working in both New York city and Ramallah, she constructs paths to lost or inaccessible places and memories with words, rough materials (such as newspaper, thread and tent canvas), and photographs. Often her work draws friends and strangers into the artistic process, using them to amplify the message. In "Sexy Semite" (2000 – 2002) she asked Palestinians in New York city to submit satirical personal ads to the Village Voice newspaper in a mock search for Jewish partners with whom they could return home via Israel's "law of return," applicable only to Jews. Jacir collaborated with strangers when she opened her studio to anyone who volunteered to sew a village name onto a refugee tent in "Memorial to 418 Palestinian Villages That Were Destroyed, Depopulated and Occupied by Israel in 1948." (2001)
In "Where We Come From," (2001 – 2003) Jacir asked Palestinians around the world and in the occupied territories: "If I could do anything for you anywhere in Palestine what would it be?" Jacir positioned herself as a conduit for others, using her American passport to traverse restricted landscapes on their behalf. As in the example reproduced in this volume, "Omayma," she documented the requests and her attempts to fulfill them in texts and photographs. Here, as in much of her work, Jacir traces the intricate Palestinian web of severed relationships, lost property and remembered experiences that crisscrosses Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.
[Cover photo by Bruno Stevens/Cosmos/Aurora]
Looks like a powerful and interesting exhibition.
Posted by: f:lux | November 02, 2007 at 11:53 PM