ART, TRUTH AND POLITICS
PALESTINIAN LEADING ARTISTS
When
all shapes have the nature of positive shapes then they have both the tendency
of seeming to push forward as well as the tendency to be pulled back by the
forward motion of neighboring shapes.
This power to change position in space and to see-saw back and forth creates
the sensations of motion even while it seems to freeze the parts. In some of
Salamah's works one senses that the textures have grown strong and the
see-sawing action might soon create an artistic explosion of color and
painterly life which will challenge the formal boundaries of the painting. It
does not enlighten us to read in the book of the exhibition about the European
history, Jewish or Crusader, which touches Salamah's birthplace. This is
merely a small fragment of a larger history of the area dating back millennia.
The imposition of this European fragment at the very start of the essay on
Salamah's paintings has nothing to do with either his work or the inspiration
of his work. In fact it is not even appropriate as history since it is
fragmentary and misleading. It leaves the reader wondering about the reasons
for such lack of focus.
Naser
Soumi
Naser
Soumi is most concerned at present with installation work. He has put heart
and soul into the creation of works which pay homage to the cities of
Palestine. I was fortunate to examine the installation work of Soumi's at
Darat Al-Funun in Jordan and to talk to Soumi about his work and to enjoy his
collection of photographs of Yafa (Jaffa). With Soumi, I share the terror of
watching our cities being razed and with it the incredible artistic and
architectural history of Palestine. I wonder if citizens of Sweden would not
feel a small part of our pain if they had to stand by helplessly watching
foreigners tear down and bulldoze each and every building on the island of
GAMLA STAN and then replace them with generic apartment buildings. A horror
such as the one Swedes might feel creates the yearning and the pride at the
base of the powerful creativity leading Soumi to make these homages to
Palestinian cities. In the installation work as homage to Yafa, Soumi placed
letters in Arabic and English from men and women who lived in Yafa and who
write about their memories. This work of art and others like it have become a
part of the process of healing and dealing with the monumental wounds created
by the ongoing Israeli destruction of Palestinian Arab society. A dialogue on
this issue continues among Palestinian Arab intellectuals of which Soumi is
aware. I lived in Yafa as a child and returned to it as an adult and produced
also a work on the subject which is available on the WORLD WIDE WEB. I would
be thunderstruck if someone told me they will do an artistic critique of this
work by telling of the history of a minority (Jewish Palestinians) which they
confusedly associate with our oppressors -- the very oppressors who are
destroying Yafa. Yet this is precisely what is done to Naser Soumi. It is
important to learn to make a distinction between Judaism and Zionism.
It
is a distinction which the book fails to make. Judaism is an ancient religion
and Zionism is a recent political movement. Clearly not every Jew supports
Zionism and most certainly not every Zionist is a Jew. Furthermore, Jews of
the Arab World are Arabs not Israelis unless they expressly change their
identity and their loyalty. Soumi's work is not presented in the exhibition
but some pictures are presented in the book. What is unfortunate in the book
is the description of unrelated fragments of history which do not enlighten us
about Soumi's work. These minuscule fragments of the history of Arab Jews and
of the Crusaders in Palestine leave me as an artist feeling doubt about the
implications of the book -- implications which may or may not be intended.
Perhaps unintentionally they belong more to a political point of view which
seeks to undermine us as Palestinian Arabs more than it seeks to enlighten the
viewer about our artistic sources.
End of the article.