Art Inspired By Palestine: From "Special Report" To "In Exile" To "Nation Estate"

The Arab world is in the midst of a boom in contemporary art. New museums are rising in the region and many Arab artists have found international audiences. Palestinian artists, whether born in (occupied) Palestine or in the diaspora, have played an invaluable role. Below are 10 extraordinary artists with mesmerizing work that is inspired by the history and culture of Palestine, past and present, and the experiences of the Palestinians, as individuals and a people.

Sharif Waked

Via sharifwaked.info

Via sharifwaked.info

A visual artist, Sharif Waked’s art blends paintings, installations and films to relate Palestinian experiences. Born in Nazareth in 1964 to Palestinian refugees expelled from their village of al-Mujaydil (an experience Palestinians call the Nakba or Catastrophe), Sharif lives and works in Nazareth and Haifa. His work has been showcased around the world, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. In the above collection, Waked takes two common orders spoken by Israeli occupation forces to Palestinians, “Get Out of Here!” and “Your I.D.!”, and re-frames them in the imperial monogram (known as the tugra) of the 16th century Ottoman Sultan Sulayman the Magnificent. “In combining the sophisticated written form of calligraphy with the banal colloquial, Waked brings Islamic art and the language of the checkpoint into an unlikely encounter.”

Dia Batal

Via diabatal.com

Via alhoush.com

Via diabatal.com

A Palestinian spatial designer based in London and Beirut, Dia Batal’s art represents both her love for Arabic calligraphy and often an invitation to actually feel her art. The above collection “Translations” reflections an Arabic calligraphy she developed that transforms in relation to both the object and its place in the room. The below paint is a “contemporary interpretation of educational alphabet posters. Vocabulary inspired by cities, public places, and inspirational people from the Arab uprisings” from Bou Azizi, the Tunisian whose self-immolation sparked the Arab uprisings, to Egypt’s center for revolutionary protest, Tahrir Square; to Palestine, which remains a passionate cause throughout the Arab world.

Abdelraouf Al Ajouri

Via alhoush.com

Via alhoush.com

Gaza-born Abdelraouf Al Ajouri often plays with the expressionist tradition and in the above series titled “Children” presents a collection of portraits where nudity stands in for the openness and honesty often found in youth, away from the mendacity and falsehood of adulthood, and all the faces appear expressive in their truth. His work has been featured in Europe and the Middle East and he is the co-founder of the E l t i q a Group for Contemporary Art in Gaza.

Suleiman Mansour

Via news.artnet.com

Via barjeelartfoundation.org

Recognized by many as the doyen of contemporary Palestinian artists, Suleiman Mansour’s has long explored the cultural idea of Sumud (Steadfastness), “part of a collective Palestinian consciousness of struggling for and clinging to the land that goes back at least to the British Mandate time” in the face of first British and later Israeli attempts to exile and dispossess the Palestinian people. In the above painting, “Camels of Hardship,” Mansour illustrates a porter carrying the city of Jerusalem on his back. It’s a recreation after the 1973 original was destroyed. In the ‘70s, the painting was reproduced into a poster and decorated the walls of countless Palestinian homes. Mansour has pointed to the “element of heritage that is present in the old man and his costume” and the “symbolism of the Dome of the Rock and Jerusalem” to explain its popularity. The below painting is titled “Sad Tunes” and the two women are wearing traditional Palestinian garments. Born in 1947 in Birzeit (a village north of Jerusalem), Mansour’s work has been exhibited everywhere from New York to Stavanger, Norway.

Abdul Rahman Katanani

Via english.al-akhbar.com

Via barjeelartfoundation.org

Born in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camp in Beirut, Lebanon, Abdul Rahman Katanani’s work is shaped by his upbringing and surroundings as he willingly remains a camp resident. Using only materials he finds in the camp – from tattered clothes to tin to cardboards – Katanani’s art seeks both to humanize Palestinian refugees and express their spirit of resistance in the face of systematic discrimination by Lebanese authorities and the squalor of the camps. The first installation was part of a series on refugee children. In Katanani’s words: “If a child’s will is broken, or if this was truly a psychological dilemma, then he/she would never be able to smile in an environment that makes it almost impossible to do so. The camp’s narrow ally is not an amusement park: it is dark, humid, and dirty. Yet you find the child playing there.” The second installation is titled “With Her Nephew Ahmad.” He has staged exhibits in Lebanon and France.

Jeffar Khaldi

Via barjeelartfoundation.org

Via barjeelartfoundation.org

Via barjeelartfoundation.org

Born in Lebanon in 1964, Jeffar Khaldi left his adopted country for the United States in the wake of Lebanon’s 1975 Civil War. His art resembles a dream-like canvass blending past and present, subverting and ridiculing media clichés about the Arab world, and often with an eye toward his homeland of Palestine. Although he does not consider himself to be a political artist, his paintings often mock injustices, including the ongoing 1967 occupation of Palestinian territory: “Well, I am an artist who happens to be Palestinian. Why should I be ashamed of something I feel like? I can try and make some strong imagery. I feel I have a responsibility to do these things. I don’t want to be like a political artist, which I am not, but this is very strong imagery – it’s a very strong subject.” His work has been showcased in galleries from London to Mexico, and he is now based in Dubai. The first painting is “Special Report” followed by “Good Stamp” and, lastly, “Munich Glamour”.

Larissa Sansour

Via larissasansour.com

Via larissasansour.com

Main Lobby

Via larissasansour.com

Jerusalem Floor

Via larissasansour.com

Manger Square

Via larissasansour.com

Olive Tree

Via larissasansour.com

Mediterranean

Via larissasansour.com

Jerusalem-born and London-based Larissa Sansour is one of the most imaginative Palestinian artists today. Her work is often subversive and political as she frames the modern Palestinian condition in the guise of pop culture with a humorous nod at Western narratives that she playfully sabotages. The above collection entitled “Nation Estate” is an illustration of a future Palestinian state in the form of a skyscraper wherein “each city has its own floor: Jerusalem on the 13th floor, Ramallah on the 14th, Sansour's native Bethlehem on the 21st and so on.” It speaks to the present reality of the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, the territory of a would-be Palestinian state, where a system of Israeli checkpoints, settlements, military zones, and walls have sliced the Palestinian landscape into cities and villages isolated from each other, as if on separate floors. The accompanying poster to the gallery is a remake of a famous 1936 Visit Palestine touristy poster by Israeli graphic artist Franz Kraus. The collection includes a video as well. “Nation Estate” was nominated for the 2011 Elysée Prize of Switzerland’s Musée de l’Elysée, but the sponsor Lacoste revoked the nomination due to its political nature, a move that sparked protest.

Steve Sabella

Via stevesabella.com

In Exile

Via stevesabella.com

In Exile

Via stevesabella.com

38 days of re-collection

Via stevesabella.com

38 days of re-collection

Via stevesabella.com

38 days of re-collection

Steve Sabella is not a man of labels. Born a Palestinian Christian in the Old City Muslim Quarter of the Israeli-occupied eastern half of Jerusalem, the Berlin-based artist recently wrote, “From his day onward, I declare that I am a citizen of planet earth and beyond.” Rejecting “any national labels and classifications attached to my name,” Sabella may object to being placed on this list as a ‘Palestinian Artist’. His art is inspired by his life not by Palestine per se, but because he is Palestinian and from Jerusalem his art reflects that reality. The collection “In Exile” (above) represents a theme Sabella has explored due to his experiences of alienation from Jerusalem. “As far as I remember I always felt out of place in my city of birth.… I was not ‘physically’ in exile. It was Jerusalem that was exiled and hence...all those who lived in it were in exile.” And “38 days of re-collection” (below) is a collection of photographs from the Old City house walls in Jerusalem. In the words of one critic, “All of the fragments attest to the lives lived, lost and forgotten within those spaces. This is a highly charged emotional work, which has at its essence time travel: exile and return, reconstruction of homeland and the past, but above all, the impermanence of the human condition." Sabella has staged exhibits in Europe, North America and the Middle East.

Mohamed Al Hawajri

Via hawajriart.blogspot.com

Via . hawajriart.blogspot.com

Via . hawajriart.blogspot.com

Via . hawajriart.blogspot.com

Via hawajriart.blogspot.com

Born in Gaza’s Al Bureij Refugee Camp in 1976, Mohamed Al Hawajri’s very art work has been affected by the blockade imposed against the territory as he has struggled at times to even acquire the necessary tools. The collection “Guernica – Gaza” was born in the aftermath of the 2008-09 Israeli attack and borrows the famous art work of Picasso, Dali, and Van Gogh among others. Hawajri displays the original “while adding [his] own contemporary touch” in a blending of past and present. The “Palestinians have been facing a particularly painful past and present,” Hawajri wrote, but the people of Gaza look toward the future as well and Hawajri often frames his art “with irony and black humour.” He chose the title “because of the similarities between the war in Gaza … and the German aggression against Spain in 1937, during which the village of Guernica was destroyed. Guernica is one of the most famous works of Picasso … [and] it is a witness of war and destruction … [and as such] is a great example of the importance of art in the documentation of reality and historical facts.” His work has been exhibited in Europe and the Middle East.

Hazem Harb

Via athrart.com

Via athrart.com

Via parisphoto.com

Another Gaza-born artist, Hazem Harb – based in Rome and Dubai –mixes installations, paintings and photographs in depicting the Palestinian reality of past dispossession and present occupation. The collection “Isolation Series” conveys the “’Ghost Towns’ that the Palestinians [live] in… surrounded by soldiers’ barracks.” Palestinian life “is transformed into cubic blocks…their sharpness and clean lines a metaphor for the harshness of separation and isolation.” The second collection is titled “Inside – Outside” and is a commentary on Israel’s separation barrier, which divides the West Bank from Israel “proper,” expropriates Palestinian land and in many ways renders Palestinians invisible to most Israelis: Through the appropriation of the Wall “and utilizing it for figurative purposes and treating it as a transparent and reflective sheet of glass, you can tell the story of the other side.” Finally, “Beyond Memory” plays with the theme of past and present. It is noteworthy that so many other Palestinian artists adopt a similar subject. The ongoing occupation and colonization of Palestine means that there can be no closure with the past as the tragedy continues into the present. “This series encompasses the geographical, social and familial history of Palestinians, both before and after 1948. The original image takes us back in time and memory, but I have digitally transformed the image… for the political and social changes to the lives of Palestinians that occurred during the 40’s have completely changed the impressions of the image’s subject.”

To learn more about Palestinian culture and history visit the Institute for Palestine Studies.

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