Dead Lands: Aissa Deebi and Rotem Rozental, Conversation and Book Launch Thursday, April 21, 2016 6:308pm ICI Curatorial Hub 401 Broadway, Suite 1620 FREE and open to the public In conjunction with the exhibition Dead Lands: Karkaot Mawat, on view at NurtureArt, CI alumna Rotem Rozental speaks with artist Aissa Deebi. This conversation begins with a failure, or rather, an impossibility. Over the past year, artist and scholar Aissa Deebi set out to realize a project based on materials housed in archives and libraries in Israel/Palestine, which were confiscated from the offices of the only daily communist (Palestinian) newspaper Al Ittihad. Deebi, who began his professional route at the newspaper as a graphic designer during the first Intifada of the late 1980s, was seeking screen shots of its covers dating back to 1986-1987. At that time, when the Israeli army censored pieces prior to publication, editorial decisions reflected these governmental interventions in various ways. Deebi was asked to include white rectangular shapes instead of the missing words; others added reports about the devastating outcomes of confrontations to photographs of soccer matches. Deebi wanted to create an installation based on these materials, but they were nowhere to be found. In a conversation with curator and photo-historian Rotem Rozental, they will discuss this project and the publication that ensued from such repeated archival defeats. This talk is held in conjunction with the exhibition Dead Lands: Karkaot Mawat, shown at NurtureArt Gallery in Bushwick (opening April 15). In this project, a group of international artists negotiate their identity in persistent struggle with the land that seeks to define, celebrate, marginalize or exclude it. Dead Lands suggests a view of the land as a point of reference, a beginning or an end, uncovering identity shaped through land, both concrete and imagined. This event is free and open to the public. To attend, please RSVP to rsvp@curatorsintl.org with AISSA in the subject line.
