IMAGES HIJACKING SCREENS FOR LIBERATION
Snapshots Reflecting Palestine (1973-2023)
Since 1969, striking iconographic imagery of the liberation of Palestine has emerged from the Palestinian resistance. From the hijacking of airplanes to the live-streaming of the Al-Aqsa flood, these images become instruments that seize newspaper headlines, media screens, and trends on social media platforms to work for the Palestinian cause. They fuel the hearts of international solidarity for liberation.
During the Cold War (1968-1982) when international solidarity between the developing world and the Palestinian cause grew, Palestinian filmmakers in collaboration with different arms of the PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization) were producing militant films destined for resistance fighters in military camps, families in refugee camps, international solidarity campaigns, progressive political organizations, activists and finally, Arab and third-world solidarity film festivals and forums. Today and since October 2023, we can witness a similar trend with regards to content creators and filmmakers from Gaza whose imagery continues to interrupt Instagram’s rigidly controlled algorithms. Their content reveals the horrors of the Palestinian struggle for survival and an unfolding Genocide, which in turn, has led to the building of spontaneous and self-organized solidarity campaigns all over the world.
IMAGES HIJACKING SCREENS FOR LIBERATION, is a film program consisting of three restored works from the film archives of the International Solidarity era and three contemporary works from post-Oslo era to the present. The program includes Mustafa Abu Ali, Basma al-Sharif, Arab Loutfi, Sami Al Salamoni, Mary Jirmanus Saba, and Tareq Rantisi. It explores the contexts NGOization, donor political economy, the ideologies of human rights and contemporary art and the return of the humanitarian gaze within a dominant global economy.
IMAGES HIJACKING SCREENS FOR LIBERATION is curated by Ali Hussein AlAdawy and is presented by ArteEast. This program is part of the legacy program Unpacking the ArteArchive, which preserves and presents 20 years of film and video programming by ArteEast. The full program will be screened online on artearchive.org from October 11 - 25.
Home Movies Gaza introduces us to the Gaza Strip as a microcosm for the failure of civilisation. In an attempt to describe the everyday of a place that struggles for the most basic of human rights, this video claims a perspective from within the domestic spaces of a territory that is complicated, derelict, and altogether impossible to separate from its political identity.
About the Filmmaker:
Palestinian artist/filmmaker Basma al-Sharif explores cyclical political histories and conflicts. In films and installations that move backward and forward in history, between place and non-place, she confronts the legacy of colonialism through satirical, immersive, and lyrical works. She received an MFA from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2007, was a resident of the Fondazione Antonio Ratti in 2009, the Pavillon Neuflize OBC at the Palais de Tokyo in 2014-15. She received a Jury prize at the Sharjah Biennial in 2009, was awarded a Visual Arts of the Fundación Botín in 2010, Mophradat’s Consortium Commissions in 2018, she was a fellow of the Berlin Artistic Research Grant Programme for 2022-2023 and was nominated for the Prix Aware for 2024. Al-Sharif’s Major exhibitions include: De Appel, the Ruttenberg Contemporary Photography Series for the Museum of the Art Institute of Chicago, Modern Mondays at MOMA, CCA Glasgow, SALT Galata, the Whitney Biennial, Here and Elsewhere at the New Museum, Berlin Documentary Forum, and Manifesta 8. Her films have screened in the international film festivals of Locarno, Berlin, Mar del Plata, Milan, London, Toronto, New York, Montreal, and Yamagata amongst others. Basma is based in Berlin and represented by Galerie Imane Farés in Paris.
- Year2013
- Runtime24 minutes
- LanguageArabic
- CountryPalestine, Gaza
- Subtitle LanguageEnglish
IMAGES HIJACKING SCREENS FOR LIBERATION
Snapshots Reflecting Palestine (1973-2023)
Since 1969, striking iconographic imagery of the liberation of Palestine has emerged from the Palestinian resistance. From the hijacking of airplanes to the live-streaming of the Al-Aqsa flood, these images become instruments that seize newspaper headlines, media screens, and trends on social media platforms to work for the Palestinian cause. They fuel the hearts of international solidarity for liberation.
During the Cold War (1968-1982) when international solidarity between the developing world and the Palestinian cause grew, Palestinian filmmakers in collaboration with different arms of the PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization) were producing militant films destined for resistance fighters in military camps, families in refugee camps, international solidarity campaigns, progressive political organizations, activists and finally, Arab and third-world solidarity film festivals and forums. Today and since October 2023, we can witness a similar trend with regards to content creators and filmmakers from Gaza whose imagery continues to interrupt Instagram’s rigidly controlled algorithms. Their content reveals the horrors of the Palestinian struggle for survival and an unfolding Genocide, which in turn, has led to the building of spontaneous and self-organized solidarity campaigns all over the world.
IMAGES HIJACKING SCREENS FOR LIBERATION, is a film program consisting of three restored works from the film archives of the International Solidarity era and three contemporary works from post-Oslo era to the present. The program includes Mustafa Abu Ali, Basma al-Sharif, Arab Loutfi, Sami Al Salamoni, Mary Jirmanus Saba, and Tareq Rantisi. It explores the contexts NGOization, donor political economy, the ideologies of human rights and contemporary art and the return of the humanitarian gaze within a dominant global economy.
IMAGES HIJACKING SCREENS FOR LIBERATION is curated by Ali Hussein AlAdawy and is presented by ArteEast. This program is part of the legacy program Unpacking the ArteArchive, which preserves and presents 20 years of film and video programming by ArteEast. The full program will be screened online on artearchive.org from October 11 - 25.
Home Movies Gaza introduces us to the Gaza Strip as a microcosm for the failure of civilisation. In an attempt to describe the everyday of a place that struggles for the most basic of human rights, this video claims a perspective from within the domestic spaces of a territory that is complicated, derelict, and altogether impossible to separate from its political identity.
About the Filmmaker:
Palestinian artist/filmmaker Basma al-Sharif explores cyclical political histories and conflicts. In films and installations that move backward and forward in history, between place and non-place, she confronts the legacy of colonialism through satirical, immersive, and lyrical works. She received an MFA from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2007, was a resident of the Fondazione Antonio Ratti in 2009, the Pavillon Neuflize OBC at the Palais de Tokyo in 2014-15. She received a Jury prize at the Sharjah Biennial in 2009, was awarded a Visual Arts of the Fundación Botín in 2010, Mophradat’s Consortium Commissions in 2018, she was a fellow of the Berlin Artistic Research Grant Programme for 2022-2023 and was nominated for the Prix Aware for 2024. Al-Sharif’s Major exhibitions include: De Appel, the Ruttenberg Contemporary Photography Series for the Museum of the Art Institute of Chicago, Modern Mondays at MOMA, CCA Glasgow, SALT Galata, the Whitney Biennial, Here and Elsewhere at the New Museum, Berlin Documentary Forum, and Manifesta 8. Her films have screened in the international film festivals of Locarno, Berlin, Mar del Plata, Milan, London, Toronto, New York, Montreal, and Yamagata amongst others. Basma is based in Berlin and represented by Galerie Imane Farés in Paris.
- Year2013
- Runtime24 minutes
- LanguageArabic
- CountryPalestine, Gaza
- Subtitle LanguageEnglish