Advertisement Close

Arts

Lebanese Designer Brings Traditional Materials Into Modern Age

By NAZANIN LANKARANI

THE NEW YORK TIMES

 

The designer Karen Chekerdjian is known in her native Lebanon for modernist objects made with traditional materials and techniques. Now, two exhibitions in Paris — at the Institut du Monde Arabe and at the private Dutko Gallery — offer a close look at an artist who addresses the divide between art and function, and the wider gap between Western and Arab cultures.

The show at the Institut du Monde Arabe, “Respiration,” opened on May 30 and runs until Aug. 28. The exhibition at the Dutko with the same title closed on Sunday, with pieces offered for sale through August.

“The idea was to show the positive elements of the Arab world,” said Philippe Castro, the chief adviser to Jack Lang, the president of the institute and a former French culture minister. “Today, that can only be shown through Arab art. There is real creativity coming out of the Arab world, especially Lebanon. Given the geopolitical context, we felt it was important to give a voice to this narrative.”

Ms. Chekerdjian, 45, who is of Armenian descent, was raised in Lebanon, the region’s most diverse society, a land unsettled by decades of conflict and turmoil, most recently by fallout from the Syrian war. She began her artistic career in film, then moved on to graphic design before earning a master’s degree in industrial design from the Domus Academy in Milan, where, she said in an interview in Paris, she learned to “think rather than design.”

“My objects do not have a traditional ‘Arab’ feel, in that they are not folkloric or ornamental,” she said. “They have emotion, ambiguity and search for meaning beyond their function. Mine is not a structured, rigid approach to objects.”

“I guess this ambiguity is typically Lebanese,” Ms. Chekerdjian said. “Beirut is a place that is both fragile and violent. My objects represent Beirut.”

At the institute show, Ms. Chekerdjian’s pieces are interspersed among objects from the permanent collection, an effort to “confirm her place within Arab heritage,” said Mr. Castro, whose visit to her studio in Beirut three years ago led to an invitation to exhibit her work.

Her “Spaceship” stools and tables are organic shapes with geometric angles threatening to take flight; arched light fixtures bisect the space they occupy; and plates carved with Arabic calligraphy are displayed alongside pieces representing the birth of Arabic writing.

Her use of traditional materials, namely gold and copper, fabricated with local smithing techniques, places her work within its regional provenance.

“There is always a Lebanese element, but I push further,” she said. “I do not reinterpret.”

Scott Longfellow, the director of D’Days, an annual design festival in Paris, said, “What is interesting is Karen’s relationship to Lebanese savoir-faire.”

“Her pieces are exceptionally well-made,” he added, noting that her designs reference a wide range of eras, including midcentury Italian and 1960s Brazil.

Ms. Chekerdjian’s show at the Institut du Monde Arabe is the first solo exhibition for a designer there, Mr. Castro said. In a low-key way, he said, her work embodies a modern, progressive edge within Arab tradition.

“Despite her orientalism, Karen is a universal artist,” Mr. Castro said. “Arab artists like her are the fresh breath that will shape the future of the region.”

Source: www.nytimes.com

Palestinian learns to make recycled art in prison

Ghassan al-Azzeh finishes off the portraits in a variety of ways, but his favourite seems to be rolling the tops and bottoms of a portrait with slender wooden poles and turning them into hanging scrolls [Sheren Khalel/Al Jazeera]  A young Palestinian pays his way through university selling recycled art he learned to make while in … Continued

Serving tea, Islam and understanding in Cleveland

How one man and his tea house are trying to foster a sense of understanding and community in the US city of Cleveland. By Angelo Merendino Aljazeera Cleveland, US – Ayman Alkayali is no stranger to feeling like a foreigner. Ayman’s parents were born in Palestine: his mother in Jaffa and his father in Ramla. … Continued

American Delivery Service Supports Local Palestinian Businesses

BY:  Kristina Perry/Contributing Writer Growing from the recent boom in subscription goods services, PalBox is a fair trade and 501(c)(3) organization that sends organic and cultural Palestinian goods in a quarterly box. Half of all proceeds from purchases of PalBox benefit the International Solidarity Movement, a nonviolent means of resisting Israeli occupation and oppression. Inside the … Continued

Etel Adnan, 91, produces 20 paintings for new Serpentine exhibition

Standard 

Lebanese-American poet and visual artist Etel Adnan, 91, has produced 20 new paintings now on display at the Serpentine Galleries in Kensington.

The Weight of the World exhibition showcases the canvasses produced this year, alongside a collection of her poetry, films and tapestries.

Etel Adnan was born in 1925 in Beirut, Lebanon, and studied philosophy at the Sorbonne in Paris before becoming a powerful voice in the poets’ movement against the Vietnam War.

The Serpentine Galleries’ exhibition is Adnan’s first ever solo exhibition in a UK public institution.

Curator Rebecca Lewin told London Live: “It was while she was living in California and studying philosophy that she started painting.

Some of Adnan’s artwork on display (London Live)
“She’s possibly better known, up until recent years, for her writing but really in the last 10 or 20 years her painting has become more discovered and this is the first UK public institution show of her work.

“She uses the painting and visual art very much as a celebration of nature and of beauty.

“The extraordinary thing about these works is not just the extraordinary vitality of the colour and the simplicity of the forms she used, but also how much they really sum up so many of the elements that go into all of the landscapes and abstract compositions she’s made throughout her career.”

Entry to the exhibition, which runs until September 11, is free.

Source: www.standard.co.uk

20 Arabic Proverbs We Love

By: Yusra Al Shawwa/Contributing Writer Proverbs have played a meaningful role in Arabic literature, poetry, and everyday conversation. Here are some of the most timeless proverbs translated from Arabic to English.          

Art Can Combat Islamophobia

By Anisa Mehdi Islamic Monthly “It’s important for mainstream Americans to hear Muslim voices,” says Omnia Hegazy, a singer-songwriter. Hegazy is not talking about political commentary, debunking Donald Trump or how some Muslims try to explain away the horrors of Daesh; she is talking about artist voices. With her acoustic guitar and bluesy lyrics backed up … Continued

‘I am Palestinian and I am human’ — and Leanne Mohamad, 15, is disqualified from UK speaking competition

By Jonathan Ofit Mondoweiss Last week, a video of a 15-year-old student at Wanstead high-school in London named Leanne Mohamad went viral. Leanne, a Palestinian, was taking part in the Jack Petchey Speak Out Challenge, where she won a regional final with her speech “Birds not Bombs”. The Jack Petchey-sponsored competition is an English competition … Continued

USPS Features “Eid Mubarak” Stamps

Many people have a few words to say about the U.S. Postal Service, but stopping by the post office is an inevitable part of American life. The next time you’re in, be sure to pick up these beautiful Eid Mubarak stamps from the U.S. Postal Service (USPS). For 2016, USPS premiered these purple stamps with gold … Continued

Noor Theatre Wins an Obie Award!

Last night, Noor Theatre was honored with an Obie Award, specifically an Obie grant that recognizes the achievements of small theater companies. We are really proud and thrilled to have been awarded. And so happy to see our own Arian Moayed honored for his gorgeous acting in Guards at the Taj (along with our longtime … Continued

Why Does PEN American Center Reject BDS, but Support Boycotts Elsewhere?

By Patrick Connors 

AlterNet 

Israeli government threats against the well-being and freedom of expression of Palestinian civil society leaders who organize for a boycott of Israel have pre-occupied human rights organizations and made headlines in recent weeks. Simultaneously, the Israeli government is escalating attacks on Palestinian writers. It is currently detaining 19 journalists and a poet.

Given these realities, it may seem surprising that just a few weeks ago an organization that promotes itself as a leading defender of writers and freedom of expression, PEN American Center, spurned calls to drop Israeli government sponsorship of PEN’s annual literary festival that ended in early May.

This long-simmering controversy bubbled over last month when over 200 writers, poets, translators and editors, and 16,500 other individuals, signed a letter initiated by Adalah-NY asking the New York City-based PEN American Center to reject Israeli government funding for PEN’s World Voices Festival (PWVF). The letter is anchored in the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel.

Literary figures including Angela Davis, Junot Díaz, Louise Erdrich, Richard Ford, Eileen Myles, Michael Ondaatje, Alice Walker, and Cornel West signed the letter. This backing reflects the growing consensus that, as with apartheid South Africa, a civil society boycott is an appropriate response to Israeli violations of fundamental Palestinian rights, which are enabled by our government’s uncritical support for Israel.

The letter asserted that:

Partnership with the Israeli government amounts to a tacit endorsement of its systematic violations of international law and Palestinian human rights, including the right to freedom of expression for writers and journalists. This is not, we emphasize, a call to boycott individual Israelis or to deny their freedom of expression.

PEN responded negatively, stating, “PEN does not and cannot subscribe to cultural boycotts of any kind—which impede individual free expression—no matter the cause.“ PEN American Center subsequently noted a 2007 policy opposing cultural boycotts.

PEN’s response was PR spin that didn’t engage the letters’ substance. As frustrated writers highlighted, the letter and the Palestinian cultural boycott call explicitly target the Israeli government and complicit institutions, do not target individual Israeli writers, and aim to preserve freedom of expression. In a meeting that I attended, PEN American Center’s Executive Director Suzanne Nossel rejected offers by writers and publishers to fundraise to cover Israeli writers participation. With Israeli writers not targeted, PEN American Center never explained whose freedom of expression it claimed to be protecting.

Adding to the hypocrisy, weeks after rejecting the letter, PEN American Center endorsed cultural boycott activities targeting Azerbaijan by signing letters asking Pharrell Williams, Enrique Iglesias and Chris Brown to “stand for human rights in Azerbaijan and cancel your Baku performance.”

PEN American Center Board Chair Andrew Solomon has, in the past, highlighted the effectiveness of cultural boycott, explaining that the cultural boycott of South Africa in the 1980s “served to undermine” and “speed the demise of apartheid.” In 2006, Suzanne Nossel proposed a “sports boycott” of Iran to support Israel.

Israel’s funding for PEN is part of a government public relations initiative called Brand Israel that uses cultural productions to distract from violations of Palestinian rights. Following Israel’s 2009 attack on Gaza, Arye Mekel,  Israeli government’s ministry’s deputy director general for cultural affairs summarized the strategy, saying, “We will send well-known novelists and writers overseas, theater companies, exhibits… This way you show Israel’s prettier face, so we are not thought of purely in the context of war.”

The Israeli government has benefited from associating itself with PEN for years. The letter noted the only three statements that PEN American Center has issued about Israeli violations of the rights of Palestinian writers and journalists. This is despite decades of abuses.

PEN American Center didn’t report, for example, on Israel’s refusal to allow Palestinian American novelists and PEN members Susan Abulhawa andRanda Jarrar to visit Palestine. Nor did it report Israel’s jailing of Palestinian cartoonist Mohamed Saba’aneh. Though the Committee to Protect Journalists ranks Israel number 101 out of 180 countries in press freedom, PEN American Center reports minimally on Israel’s escalating repression of Palestinian journalists. Only after days of social media pressure this April did PEN American Centercriticize Israel’s arrest of journalist Omar Nazza and express meek “concerns” about poet Dareen Tatour’s arrest.

PEN American Center’s current executive director Suzanne Nossel worked for the State Department for years, most recently under Hillary Clinton, where the “defense of Israel” was among her priorities. Nossel is now a volunteer adviser to Clinton’s presidential campaign, and is rumored to aspire to a post in a possible Clinton administration.

Nossel coined the term “smart power,” writing:

“Smart power means knowing that the United States’ own hand is not always its best tool. U.S. interests are furthered by enlisting others,” including “international institutions.”

She also asserted that “military power and humanitarian endeavors can be mutually reinforcing.” Some PEN members told us that PEN’s positions increasingly resembles those of the State Department, and they fear it is being turned into an instrument of an interventionist, militaristic US foreign policy, as Nossel is accused of attempting when with Amnesty International USA.

Candidate Clinton has repeatedly stated her unwavering commitment to Israel, and falsely conflated the movement to boycott Israel with anti-Semitism. Therefore, it seems likely that Nossel doesn’t want PEN to be seen as acceding to the boycott.

Still there is hope for change, because so many are troubled by PEN American Center’s unprincipled stance. Significantly, PEN International, the organization’s global hub, has vowed to act. PEN International’s president Jennifer Clement wrote in a press release, “PEN International shares your concern. At present we are formalizing our recommended guidelines for the world’s PEN Centres regarding funding from countries with a poor record on freedom of expression.”

PEN American Center may try to extricate itself by adopting a policy prohibiting funding from repressive governments, including the Israeli government, while sidestepping a formal endorsement of a boycott of Israel. This would be a victory for human rights. Still, it would be more intellectually honest for PEN American Center to directly grapple with the Palestinian cultural boycott’s emphasis on individual freedom of expression, and to address PEN’s contradictory endorsement of cultural boycott activities targeting Azerbaijan.

Whatever the ultimate outcome, the broad support for PEN to reject Israeli government funding is another example of the growing strength of the Palestinian boycott movement for freedom, justice and equality.

Source: www.alternet.org

SkateQilya is Using Skateboarding and Art to Teach Palestinian Youth

SkateQilya Press Release/Special to Arab America In October of 2013 a skate ramp was built in Palestine. Mohammed Othman and Adam Abel, two filmmakers who have been making a documentary film about a community of alternative athletes and artists in Qalqliya, organized the project and brought three U.S. professional skaters to Qalqilya to lead the … Continued

312 Results (Page 16 of 26)