HEKLER Medium: War, Memory, Protest event series took place on Saturday, October 13, 6-9 pm at De-Construkt [projekts] in Red Hook (41 Seabring St). The roundtable conversation organized in collaboration with Farideh Sakhaeifar and Sadra Shahab focused on exhibited artworks that examine the relationships between the economy of war and the visual culture.

The event started with a short introduction about HEKLER and the series, followed by the screening of videos and photography by Bisan Abu Eisheh, Saba Alizadeh, Sahar S., and Mandana Mansouri. After the screening and leading to the discussion, guests were served traditional Iranian dish Ghormeh Sabzi prepared by Farideh and Sadra. Moderated by Manijeh Nasrabadi and Zahra Ali, the conversation open to participants in the attempt to deconstruct a hierarchical structure between the speaker and the audience creating an environment where everybody has a chance to reflect upon and discuss questions provoked by the presented projects and provided readings. Below you can find more information about moderators, artists and presented art works.

Događaj HEKLER Medium: Rat, sećanje, protest održan je u subotu, 13. oktobra, od 18 do 21 sat u De-Construkt [projekts] u Red Huku (Sibring 41). Razgovor organizovan u saradnji sa Farideh Sakhaeifar i Sadrom Shahab fokusirao se na izložene umetničke radove, koji ispituju odnose između ekonomije rata i vizuelne kulture.

Događaj je započeo kratkim uvodom o HEKLER-u, nakon čega je usledila projekcija video radova i fotografija Bisana Abu Išeha, Sabe Alizadeha, Sahar S. i Mandane Mansuri. Nakon projekcije i diskusije, gostima je posluženo tradicionalno iransko jelo Ghormeh Sabzi koje su pripremili Farideh i Sadra. Moderatorke Maniže Nasrabadi i Zahra Ali otvorile su razgovor za prisutne vežbajući dekonstruisanje hijerarhijske strukture između govornika i publike, stvarajući okruženje u kojem svi imaju priliku da promišljaju i diskutuju o pitanjima koja su izazvali predstavljeni radovi i ponuđeni tekstovi. U nastavku možete pronaći više informacija o moderator, umetnic_ma i predstavljenim radovima.

HEKLER Medium: War, Memory, Protest was accompanied by the zine designed by Jelene Prljević.

HEKLER Medium: Rat, pamćenje, protest je propraćen zinom koji je dizajnirala Jelene Prljević.

Photo Credit: Francesca Tirpak

Free PDF

Click cover for interactive viewing

ARTISTS

Bisan Abu-Eisheh (1985) is a Palestinian artist from East Jerusalem. He is a PhD candidate at CREAM PhD programme at the University of Westminster and holds a M.A. form Central Saint Martins and the B.A. from the International Academy of Art – Palestine. He currently lives between Glasgow, London and Jerusalem.

Bayt Byoot Playing House is an installation of a collection of pieces Bisan gathered from  demolished houses in East Jerusalem. They range from objects of daily and personal life, such as pieces of clothing, kitchen utensils, and CDs, to parts of the architecture, such as granite, wood, and pipes. The pieces are presented in museum-like vitrines, each with a label describing where it comes from, the date of the demolition, and the number of people displaced from each house.  Also, included in each vitrine, a detailed map of Jerusalem that links each of the objects with the neighborhood where it was collected from and a video of an explosion of the demolition of a five-story building in Beit Hanina, a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem.

The video screened at HEKLER Medium: War, Memory, Protest - Playing House - The shoe, focuses on exploring narratives related to the collected items and their intimate relation with their owners. This video particularly is about a young boy who lost his favorite shoe while his house was being demolished by the Israeli Authorities.

Selected Group Exhibitions: Jerusalem Lives, The Palestinian Museum, Birzeit, Palestine (2017). Don’t You Think It Is Time For Love? MMoMA, Moscow, Russia (2016). Jerusalem Show VIII: Before and After Origins, Jerusalem, Palestine (2016). Greetings to Those Who Asked About Me, CIC, Cairo, Egypt (2015). Eva International: AGITATIONISM, Limerick, Ireland (2014). Hiwar “conversations in Amman”, Darat Al Funon, Amman, Jordan (2013). Points of Departure, ICA Gallery, London, UK (2013). The 12th Istanbul Biennial: UNTITELED (2011).

He has programmed Hospitalfield’s Summer School: Fieldworks 2016, under the title “Not Every Tent is The Same”, Arbroath, Scotland. He has performed in several art events including: Bitter Rose Project part of Glasgow International 2016, Glasgow, UK and Friday Late night at V&A museum, London, UK (2012).

Selected Residencies: Art OMI, NY, USA (2018), Culture + Conflict Artist in Residence at the Liddle Hart Colonial archive, Kings Collage, London, UK (2016/17). Künstlerhaus Büchsenhausen International Fellowship Program for Art and Theory, Innsbruck, Austria (2015). AIR Antwerpen residency program, Antwerp, Belgium (2014/2015).Hiwar “Conversations in Amman” at Darat al Funon Foundation, Amman, Jordan. (2013). Radio Materiality at Vessel Art Project, Bari, Italy (2013). Points of Departure at The Delfina Foundation (2012).

Mandana Mansouri is an artist who works with still and moving images, language, performance, and site-specific installations. Her work is concerned with bare-life, power, production of space,displacement, and visibility. In her recent body of work, A Machine for Living in, Mansouri references the subject of labor exploitation and the visibility of Afghan refugees in Iran, both in the white cube and on the cityscape. For this series, Mandana shared the photo documentation of the site-specific installation A Machine for Living in.

Mansouri was born in Kermanshah, Iran, in 1982, and currently works and lives in Vancouver. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Architecture from Azad University, Qazvin, a Master's in Urban Design from Azad University, Tehran, and is currently an MFA candidate at the University of British Columbia,Vancouver. Her work has been included in recent exhibitions at the University of British Columbia,Vancouver; Gallery 1515, Vancouver; and Azad Art Gallery, Tehran. Mansouri has collaborated with art collectives such as Photocopy, New Media Society, Architecture Urbanism Circle in Tehran. She used to work as an architect/urban designer for more than ten years, in this essay she articulates her personal narrative and experience of the production of residential spaces in Tehran.

Saba Alizadeh born in Tehran 1983, is a photographer, performer and composer. Alizadeh holds a BFA degree in photography from Azad university in Tehran and an MFA in Music Composition from California institute of Arts. Saba is an internationally acclaimed photographer. His “Light & Soil” series has been exhibited in different cities such as London, Washington D.C., Paris, Moscow,Tehran and festivals such as Arles photography festival in France. Saba as a musician in the experimental realm in which his pieces tend to have a theatrical element. Alizadeh's compositions evoke both the personal and the political through the use of mixed media, electroacoustic processing and improvisation.

Sahar S.

Magic Meadow Baba (performing white clown)

I created this video for my father, as a way to document one of the many stories of his life as a refugee immigrant. My mother and I came to the U.S. during the Iran Iraq War, from Iran, in the 80’s. My father spent many years trying to reach us. This was the last and first film I made with my father. He was very ill during the filming. I shot the green screened section in a meadow called Magic Meadow in Upstate, NY. My father was too ill to come along so I transported his body via, the screen. I never really finished editing this video. Like our lives together I never will. It is a sentiment and a gift to have this documentation. Which, I performed in a surreal realization of my own relationship to these stories and language as a first generation American.

As a way to understand the parallels between our struggles as immigrants and how we are constantly translating our stories through one another, I wanted to write a script and decided to transcribe his words instead. I worked through repetition, in revisiting feelings of displacement, empathy, and understanding. My father lived in many countries, was homeless, stateless, and went to prison. He tells these stories from the perspective of a survivor, who understands the depths of humor and sensuality.

Sahar S. is concerned with the virtual self as a metaphorical space of translation, where diasporic displacement meets object orientation and new approaches to time and space. Her work is time based, utilizing video art, AR, sculpture, performance and installation. She builds and inhabits worlds that look to political modes of deconstruction, as ways to activate her audience in what she hopes are self-reflexive and affective moments of recognition, of self and society. Her practice is very much based in language.

Sahar is currently a graduate candidate at School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has shown at Spectacle Theatre, Eyebeam, and Pulsar. She has performed at The New Museum as part of My Barbarian’s PoLAAT Intro: Post Paradise residency, Judson Memorial Church for Jessica Posner’s Body Butter Politics and Performa NYC for Lior Shivl’ s Protocols at Art in General. Her work was featured in a group show at Bronx Art Space called For Us in the Spring, which was written about in Art Forum. She also curates an ongoing digital arts show called Digital Diaspora, which features artists from all over the world, within the Islamic Diaspora, centering Black Muslim Artists.

Sahar’ response to HEKLER Medum: War, Memory, Protest can be read here.

MODERATORS

Manijeh Nasrabadi is assistant professor of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Barnard College. Prior to joining the Barnard faculty, she was a University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellow in Asian American Studies at UC Davis and an Andrew Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in Comparative Revolutions at Brandeis University. She received her PhD in American Studies from NYU and her MFA from Hunter College, City University of New York. She is the former co-director of the Association of Iranian American Writers. Her book, Neither Washington, Nor Tehran: Iranian Internationalism in the United States, is forthcoming from Duke University Press. Her essays and articles have appeared in the Routledge Handbook of the Global Sixties, Scholar & Feminist online, Women’s Studies Quarterly, Comparative Studies of South Asian, Africa, and the Middle East, Social Text online, jadaliyya.com, and Callaloo. She is a founding member of the Raha Iranian Feminist Collective.

Her research focuses on political cultures of the Iranian diaspora in the U.S., tracing generational shifts in subjectivity, transnational activism, and cultural production across the historical arc of U.S.-Iran relations. Her methodological approach takes seriously memory, affect and emotion as an archive of marginalized knowledges, gendered histories and diasporic identity formations that can disrupt assimilation and produce alternatives to heteronormative model minority subjectivity.

Recent Literary Non-fiction and Journalism:

The Weight of the Skies: An Iranian revolutionary journey in the U.S. Spring 2014.

Bi Taarof: A magazine of Iranian American Arts and Culture

Tremors: New Fiction by Iranian American Writers. Book review. August 2013. Jadaliyya.com

New Perspectives on the Anti-War Movement. May 2012. Jadaliyya.com

Letter from Tehran: Interview with Iranian Feminists. June 2011 Jadaliyya.com

Finding Our Voices: New Writers from the Post-revolution Generation. May 2009. TehranBureau.com

A Far Corner of the Revolution. Callaloo (Winter 2009) 32 (4): 1198–1207.

Zahra Ali / د. زهراء علي is a sociologist, her research explores dynamics of women and gender, social and political movements in relation to Islam(s) and the Middle East and contexts of war and conflicts with a focus on contemporary Iraq. She is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Rutgers university. Her book Women and Gender in Iraq: between Nation-building and Fragmentation published by Cambridge University Press, is a sociological study of Iraqi women’s social, political activism and feminisms through an in-depth ethnography of post-2003 Iraqi women’s rights organizations and a detailed research on Iraqi women’s social, economic and political experiences since the formation of the Iraqi state.

She also co-edited the journal volume Pluriversalisme Décolonial with Prof Sonia Dayan-Herzbrun (Kimé, 2017) that explores decolonial theories reflecting on non-eurocentric epistemologies, aesthetics, political thoughts and activisms. The volume draws on Latin American and Caribbean philosophies, concepts of creolization and racialization and explores Afropean aesthetics, arts and cultural productions, religion, feminisms, fashion, education and architecture. Zahra Ali also edited Féminismes Islamiques (La Fabrique editions, 2012; translated and published in German Passagen Verlag, 2014) that reflects on transnational Islamic/Muslim feminisms through a postcolonial and intersectional feminist perspective analyzing the interrelationship between race, gender, religion and postcoloniality.

UMETNICI/E

Bisan Abu-Eišeh (1985) je palestinski umetnik iz istočnog Jerusalima. On je doktorant na CREAM doktorskom programu na Univerzitetu Vestminster, a magistrirao je na Central Saint Martins u Londonu i Međunarodnoj akademiji umetnosti – Palestina. Trenutno živi između Glazgova, Londona i Jerusalima.

Bayt Byoot Kuća za igru je instalacija kolekcije delova koje je Bisan sakupio iz  srušenih kuća u istočnom Jerusalimu. Oni obuhvataju predmete iz svakodnevnog i ličnog života, kao što su delovi odeće, kuhinjski pribor i CD-ovi, delove arhitekture, kao što su granit, drvo i cevi. Komadi su predstavljeni u vitrinama nalik muzejskim, svaka sa etiketom koja opisuje poreklo predmeta, datum rušenja i broj ljudi raseljenih iz svake kuće. Takođe, u svaku vitrinu uključena je detaljna mapa Jerusalima koja povezuje svaki od objekata sa komšilukom odakle je prikupljena i video snimak eksplozije rušenja petospratnice u Beit Hanini, palestinskom naselju na istoku Jerusalima.

Video prikazan na HEKLER Medium: Rat, pamćenje, protest - Kuća za igru - Patika, fokusira se na istraživanje narativa koji se odnose na prikupljene predmete i njihov intimni odnos sa njihovim vlasnicima. Ovaj video je posebno o dečaku koji je izgubio svoju omiljenu patiku dok su mu izraelske vlasti rušile kuću.

Odabrane grupne izložbe: Jerusalimski životi, Palestinski muzej, Birzeit, Palestina (2017). Zar ne mislite da je vreme za ljubav? MMoMA, Moskva, Rusija (2016). Jerusalimska emisija VIII: Pre i posle porekla, Jerusalim, Palestina (2016). Pozdrav onima koji su pitali za mene, CIC, Kairo, Egipat (2015). Eva International: AGITACIONIZAM, Limerik, Irska (2014). Hivar „razgovori u Amanu“, Darat Al Funon, Aman, Jordan (2013). Polazna tačka, Galerija ICA, London, UK (2013). 12. Istanbulsko bijenale: BEZ NAZIVA (2011).

Programirao je Hospitalfield letnju školu: Fieldworks 2016, pod naslovom „Nije svaki šator isti“, Arbroat, Škotska. Nastupao je na nekoliko umetničkih događaja uključujući: Bitter Rose Project u okviru Glasgov International 2016, Glasgov, UK i Friday Late night u muzeju V&A, London, UK (2012).

Izabrane rezidencije: Art OMI, NI, SAD (2018), Kultura + konflikt umetnik u rezidenciji u Liddle Hart kolonijalnoj arhivi, Kings Collage, London, UK (2016/17). Međunarodni program stipendista Kunstlerhaus Buchsenhausen za umetnost i teoriju, Insbruk, Austrija (2015). Rezidencijalni program AIR Antverpen, Antverpen, Belgija (2014/2015). Hivar „Razgovori u Amanu“ u Darat al Funon fondaciji, Aman, Jordan (2013). Radio materijalnost u Vessel Art Project, Bari, Italija (2013). Polazna tačka u Fondaciji Delfina (2012).

Mandana Mansouri je umetnica koji radi sa nepokretnim i pokretnim slikama, jezikom, izvedbom i instalacijama specifičnim za sajt. Njen rad se bavi golim životom, snagom, proizvodnjom prostora, pomeranjem i vidljivošću. U svom nedavnom delu, Mašini za život, Mansuri se poziva na temu radne eksploatacije i vidljivosti avganistanskih izbeglica u Iranu, kako u galeriji (white cube) tako i u gradskom prostoru. Za ovu seriju, Mandana je podelila fotodokumentaciju site-specifične instalacije Mašina za život.

Mansouri je rođena 1982. u Kermanšahu, Iran, a trenutno radi i živi u Vankuveru. Diplomirala je arhitekturu na Univerzitetu Azad u Kazvinu, magistrirala Urbani dizajn na Univerzitetu Azad u Teheranu, a trenutno je MFA kandidatkinja na Univerzitetu Britanske Kolumbije u Vankuveru. Njen rad je predstavljen u okviru izložbi na Univerzitetu Britanske Kolumbije, Galeriji 1515 i umetničkoj galeriji Azad u Teheranu. Mansouri je sarađivala sa umetničkim kolektivima kao što su Photocopy, New Media Society, Architecture Urbanism Circle u Teheranu. Radila je kao arhitektica/urbana dizajnerka više od deset godina, u ovom eseju ona artikuliše svoj lični narativ i iskustvo proizvodnje stambenih prostora u Teheranu.

Saba Alizadeh, rođen 1983. u Teheranu, je fotograf, izvođač i kompozitor. Alizadeh ima BFA diplomu iz fotografije na Azad univerzitetu u Teheranu, a magistrirao je muzičku kompoziciju na Kalifornijskom institutu za umetnost. Saba je međunarodno priznati fotograf. Njegova serija „Svetlo i tlo” izlagana je u različitim gradovima poput Londona, Vašingtona, Pariza, Moskve, Teherana i na festivalima kao što je festival fotografije u Arlu u Francuskoj. Saba je muzičar eksperimentalne oblasti u kojoj njegovi komadi imaju teatarske tendencije. Alizadehove kompozicije evociraju i lično i političko kroz upotrebu mešovitih medija, elektroakustičke obrade i improvizacije.

Sahar S.

Otac iz magične poljane (izvođenje belog klovna)

Napravila sam ovaj video za svog oca, kao način da dokumentujem jednu od mnogih priča o njegovom životu kao izbegličkom imigrantu. Moja majka i ja smo došli u SAD tokom Iransko-iračkog rata, iz Irana, 80-ih. Moj otac je proveo mnogo godina pokušavajući da dođe do nas. Ovo je bio poslednji i prvi film koji sam snimila sa svojim ocem. Bio je veoma bolestan tokom snimanja. Snimili smo deo sa zelenim ekranom na livadi koja se zove Magična poljana u Upstate, Njujork. Moj otac je bio previše bolestan da bi došao, pa sam prenela njegovo telo putem ekrana. Nikad nisam završila montažu ovog videa. Kao i naši zajednički životi, nikada neću. Saosećanje i dar je imati ovu dokumentaciju. Koju sam izvela u nadrealnoj realizaciji sopstvenog odnosa prema ovim pričama i jeziku kao Amerikanka prve generacije.

Kao način da razumem paralele između naših imigrantskih borbi i načina na koji neprestano prevodimo naše priče jedne kroz druge, prvo sam želela da napišem scenario i odlučila da umesto toga transkribujem njegove reči. Radila sam kroz ponavljanje, u ponovno razmatranje osećanja izmeštenosti, empatije i razumevanja. Moj otac je živeo u mnogim zemljama, bio je beskućnik, bez državljanstva i u zatvoru. On priča ove priče iz perspektive preživelog, koji razume dubinu humora i senzualnosti.

Sahar S. se bavi virtuelnim sopstvom kao metaforičkim prostorom prevođenja, gde se dijasporsko izmeštanje susreće sa objektnom orijentacijom i novim pristupima vremenu i prostoru. Njen rad je zasnovan na vremenu, koristeći video umetnost, AR, skulpturu, performans i instalaciju. Ona gradi i naseljava svetove koji gledaju na političke načine dekonstrukcije, kao na načine aktiviranja publike ka, nada se, samorefleksivnim i afektivnim trenucima prepoznavanja sebe i društva. Njena praksa je u velikoj meri zasnovana na jeziku.

Sahar je trenutno diplomirani kandidat na School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Nastupala je u Teatru spektakla, Eyebeam-u i Pulsaru. Nastupala je u Novom muzeju kao deo Mi Barbarian’s PoLAAT Intro: Post Paradise rezidencija, Judson Memorial Church za Bodi Butter Politics Jessice Posner-a i Performa NYC za Protocols Lior Shivl-a u Art in General. Njen rad je predstavljen na grupnoj izložbi u Bronx Art Space-u pod nazivom Za nas u proleće, o kojoj je pisano u Art Forumu. Ona takođe vodi tekuću digitalnu umetničku emisiju pod nazivom Digitalna dijaspora, koja predstavlja umetnike iz celog sveta, unutar islamske dijaspore, sa fokusom na crne muslimanske umetnike i umetnice.

Saharin odgovor na učešće u događaju HEKLER Medum: rat, pamćenje, protest možete pročitati ovde.

MODERATORKE

Manijeh Nasrabadi je docentica na ženskim studijama, studijama roda i seksualnosti na Barnard koledžu. Pre nego što se pridružila fakultetu Barnard, bila je postdoktorantska saradnica na azijsko-američkim studijama na University of California na UC Davis i Andrew Mellon na Komparativnim revolucijama na Univerzitetu Brandeis. Doktorirala je američke studije na NYU i magistrirala na Hunter koledžu u Njujorku. Bivša je kodirektorka Udruženja iransko-američkih pisaca. Njena knjiga, Ni Vašington, ni Teheran: Iranski internacionalizam u Sjedinjenim Državama, izlazi u izdanju Duke University Press. Njeni eseji i članci su se pojavili u Routledge Handbook of the Global Sixties, Scholar & Feminist online, Women’s Studies Quarterly, Comparative Studies of South Asian, Africa, and the Middle East, Social Text online, jadaliyya.com, and Callaloo. Ona je osnivač iranskog feminističkog kolektiva Raha.

Njeno istraživanje se fokusira na političke kulture iranske dijaspore u SAD, prateći generacijske smene u subjektivnosti, transnacionalnom aktivizmu i kulturnoj proizvodnji kroz istorijski luk američko-iranskih odnosa. Njen metodološki pristup ozbiljno shvata pamćenje, afekt i emocije kao arhivu marginalizovanih znanja, rodnih istorija i dijasporskih identitetskih formacija koje mogu poremetiti asimilaciju i proizvesti alternative heteronormativnom modelu manjinske subjektivnosti.

Nedavna književna nefikcija i novinarstvo:

The Weight of the Skies: An Iranian revolutionary journey in the U.S. Spring 2014.

Bi Taarof: A magazine of Iranian American Arts and Culture

Tremors: New Fiction by Iranian American Writers. Book review. August 2013. Jadaliyya.com

New Perspectives on the Anti-War Movement. May 2012. Jadaliyya.com

Letter from Tehran: Interview with Iranian Feminists. June 2011 Jadaliyya.com

Finding Our Voices: New Writers from the Post-revolution Generation. May 2009. TehranBureau.com

A Far Corner of the Revolution. Callaloo (Winter 2009) 32 (4): 1198–1207.

Zahra Ali / د. زهراء علي je sociološkinja koja istražuje dinamiku žena i roda, društvenih i političkih pokreta u odnosu na islam(e) i Bliski Istok, kontekste rata i sukoba sa fokusom na savremeni Irak. Ona je docent sociologije na Univerzitetu Rutgers. Njena knjiga Žene i rod u Iraku: između izgradnje nacije i fragmentacije koju je objavio Cambridge University Press, je sociološka studija o društveno-političkom aktivizmu i feminizmima iračkih žena putem dubinske etnografije iračkih organizacija za ženska prava nakon 2003., detaljno istraživanje društvenih, ekonomskih i političkih iskustava iračkih žena od formiranja iračke države.

Sa profesoricom Sonia Dayan-Herzbrun (Kimé, 2017) uređivala je izdanje časopisa Pluriversalisme Décolonial koji istražuje dekolonijalne teorije sa osvrtom na neevrocentrične epistemologije, estetiku, političke misli i aktivizam. Knjiga se oslanja na latinoameričku i karipsku filozofiju, koncepte kreolizacije i rasizma i istražuje afroevropsku estetiku, umetnost i kulturnu produkciju, religiju, feminizam, modu, obrazovanje i arhitekturu. Zahra Ali je takođe uređivala Féminismes Islamiques (izdanja La Fabrikue, 2012; prevedeno i objavljeno u nemačkom Passagen Verlag, 2014) koji se osvrće na transnacionalne islamske/muslimanske feminizme kroz postkolonijalnu i intersekcionalnu feminističku perspektivu analizirajući međuodnose rase, roda, religije i postkolonijalnosti.