The video work »This Day« (France/Lebanon 2003, 86 min.) is based on three years of research on the production and circulation of images in the Middle East. It goes on both an externally directed geographical journey and an internally directed exploration of memory (the recording of everyday life). Video and photography are used to address mobility and standstill in this currently divided region. At the beginning, it is about the constantly changing desert where Arab civilisation – allegedly – has its origins. In what follows, the landscapes of the Syrian desert are subjected to a reconstruction and new desert views are contrasted with views of Arab cities. The various pictures, whether historical or contemporary, private or public in nature, ceaselessly examine and comment on each other. Overall, the project enquires how the distribution of certain documents (images and sounds) on television, in publications or on the Web expand our understanding of the prevailing visual culture and influence the production of images of our familiar or urban spaces.

»This Day« was commissioned by the Museum Nicephore Niepce (France).

Akram Zaatari lives in Beirut as an artist and curator and is co-founder of the Fondation Arabe pour l’image.

All pictures: courtesy of Akram Zaatari and Galerie Sfeir-Semler, Hamburg/Beirut

 

Translated by Timothy Jones

 

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