Necessary Journey, 2006, film
Commissioned by Arts Council England’s initiative Necessary Journeys, taking its cue from Black World Initiative.
Follwing an advert in ArtSchool Palestine, Ashery was approached by the Ramallah-based artist, illustrator and renowned architect Sameh Aboushi. Aboushi and Ashery sustained a long email exchange over many months, until they met at Qalandia Checkpoint and spent a day together in Ramallah. Necessary Journey charts Ashery’s meeting with Aboushi, as well a footage of Ashery’s father searching for his grandparents’ shoe shop in the Muslim quarter of Jerusalem’s old city. The video is an attempt to locate Ashery’s family history within the current reality of the occupation. The video ends with a quote from Jean Genet’s Prisoner of Love.
An international symposium about artistic journeys, departures and returns
11 – 12 November 2005
Arts Council England and Tate Modern
Bankside
London SE1 9TG
Image: Keith Piper, Ghosting the Archive, 2005. Courtesy the artist.
Tickets are for sale, booking recommended. www.tate.org.uk/modern or call 44 20 7887 8888.
Ricardo Basbaum, Caryl Phillips, Harold Offeh, Jonzi D, Rene Gabri, Ayreen Anastas, Tirdad Zolghadr, Irit Rogoff, Jackie Kay, Keith Piper, susan pui san lok, Kodwo Eshun, Fernando Arias, Oreet Ashery, Dinu Li, Margareta Kern, Ralph Hoyte, Jiva Parthipan, and Trevor Woolery.
Through a series of departures and returns, artists have occasionally deployed the recurring motifs of the journey: exploration, discovery, revelation and transformation. This strategy has allowed them to critically navigate the global spaces of displacement and diaspora, and the high anxiety of belonging.
Ashery has consistently grappled with ways of contextualising cultural and artistic collaborations between Palestinians and Israelis, without normalising the occupation, as part of her practice. Relevant works include elements of the project Welcome Home, as well as The Novel of Nonel and Vovel, a book publication, residency and live events with the visual artist Larissa Sansour.
Links/Downloads:
Review: Barry Schwabsky, ‘Oreet Ashery DVD’, MAP, Spring 2008
Additional project information: e-flux
Additional project information: No Man’s Land film programme
Additional project information: Welcome Home dedicated project website