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Occidentalism: Tool as Symbol |
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Aida el Torie |
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Occidentalism was a show curated by Lebanese gallerist Karim Francis which was one of the concluding experiences for the Cairo spring season this year. With a selection of nineteen artists commissioned to produce work around a question of re-orientation they explored themes of the occident; that is the reversal of traditional roles as the East turns its gaze to the West and reflects on its own identity through a glass mirror. The symbolism used in the works produced for the show became a principal representation of the arts in Cairo as we were confronted by a show that placed the east and west under a microscope with the enduring question: How do you view the West? However it focused not so much on how the East viewed the West as much as on how the East viewed, and indeed continues to view itself through its own eyes, breaking the western cliché of the orient. The body of work came from prominent names such as Mohamed Abla, Nermine El Ansari, Lara Baladi, Adel El Siwi, Hazem Taha Hussein, Hazem El Mistikawy, Heba Farid, Khaled Hafez, Amal Kenawy, Huda Lutfi, Shady El Noshokaty, Ahmed Nosseir, Hany Rashed, Sabah Naim, Mohamed Taman, Islam Zaher, Hisham El Zeiny along with the strong emerging voices Sherif El Azma and Nader Sadek. All the works displayed unique signature styles of identity and a great deal of iconography that remains yet unchanged since the foundation of the arts. The signs are of a contemporary era, a reflection of a highly globalized digital culture consumed by the speed and availability of information. Though a couple of decades apart, Khaled Hafez and Nader Sadek are two artists whose particular installed objects bordered on the tools of cultural hegemony; Cairo-based Khaled Hafez is an international practitioner and an artist whose career spans many generations. Part of the second wave movement of contemporary Egyptian artists, Cairo witnessed first, second and third wave pioneers across a 70-year interval of colonialism, nationalism, and post-revolutionism. During the past two decades alone Cairo has witnessed the evolution of contemporary art through three generations, each pioneering the development of a collective national identity versus an individual voice. Hafez reflects on the social and political effects of a post-war and post-revolution Egypt and its nostalgic longings for the once upon a time Golden Age that disappeared with the extreme thirst for nationalism. In his work REVOLUTION: Liberty, Social Equity, Unity, Every Revolution Comes with a Bag of Unfulfilled Promises, Hafez plays with three tools: the gun, the hammer and the blade. The Beretta is originally a standard Italian pistol of the early sixteenth century used by the military of Venice. In the 1980s the firearm market was taken over by the American military in manufacturing and distributing the M9 Parabellum, used in Hafez’s installation as the most common pistol for entry-level shooters. A Hollywood sensation, the Beretta is seen in the hands of Bruce Willis and Mel Gibson for their action hits Die Hard and Lethal Weapon, to name a few. It is also a popular training arm under the National Rifle Association. A biased tool of American propaganda, Hafez regenerates its importance as the tool of the Egyptian militant, the national protagonist of the 1952 revolution. The first screen installation shows Social Equity; the militant trained to execute unfulfilled national promises, helplessly deluded that he can under the red stripe of the Egyptian flag. The second screen shows Liberty dressed in a business suit contrasted by a hammer beating iron nails over a white linen tablecloth. This is the part of the flag where the yellow eagle stands with its spread wings in liberty and unity holding the ribbon of the Arab Republic of Egypt. Completing the triad is the butcher’s blade also known as the satour. The protagonist is Unity in the black stripe. A right wing fundamentalist dressed in a traditional white jalabiyya is slaughtering blonde dolls. A sexual misdemeanor occurs between the conservative extremist holding a symbol of the female body and decapitating her out of social, political and cultural contradictions. The clash of extremes continues to go head to head as the identity of the nationalist, the protagonist or simply the artist are always under construction. Hafez’s tools are also his weapons. Whether they function to destroy or rebuild; the pistol, hammer and blade are the instruments of the orchestration of an Egyptian twentieth century freedom fighter. New York-based Nader Sadek invites the viewer to walk away from national concerns and instead is welcomed to muse upon the culinary array of methods of inhumane conduct. A table is installed to the side of the room, draped in a rose sewn cloth and a white porcelain plate is neatly placed between silver utensils. Ready to dine, the specials are an inedible raw chunk of synthetic meat taking the shape of pliers. Constructed out of silicon the pink texture is slightly translucent and a blue vein is distinctly seen in one of the handles. Laid beside a branch of dill, the cold tool is a disturbing reflection on the brutality of animal slaughter in the west concealed by lavish cuisine and nauseously consumed by inhumane concerns. Worry in the House of Thieves encourages the viewer to think twice about select dining as Sadek plays the role of an animal rights fighter from the East where the animal is personally and ritualistically slaughtered by an incision to the jugular vein; a practice enforced by religion for concerns of purity. However, Sadek is a recent resident of the West where the death of an animal is an industrialized murder which takes place at a factory farm using electricity or the striking percussion of a solid object against the animals’ head with a degree of fatal force, hence the pliers. The symbolism used by both artists shares a commonality in that it both functions as a tool and weapon in the expression of identity and social conduct demonstrating their release from any Western cliché. Khaled Hafez and Nader Sadek explore themes not about the West, but about the re-orientation of the East and its social and political changes. There is no “us” and “them” in the “Occident” and the “Orient” as the contemporary Egyptian society has become a melting pot of constructive identities using the visual language as a tool of knowledge. Statements are shared and exchanged to reflect and engage in concerns voiced by contemporary artists of whom Hafez and Sadek are two distinct voices of many others.
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