Exhibitions

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Shifting Sands

From June 02, 2023 until September 24, 2023Mondays through Sundays, from 10:00 a.m. to 800 p.m. Closed from August 1 to 21.

MADRID

Closed on monday 31 july and from 1 to august 20

Casa Árabe Hall of Columns (at Calle Alcalá, 62. Basement Level). Mondays through Sundays, from 10:00 a.m. to 800 p.m. Closed from August 1 to 21. Free entry until the room’s capacity is reached.

In Spanish.

Starting on Friday, June 2, you can visit this exhibition at Casa Árabe’s headquarters in Madrid. The exhibit, curated by David Drake, was the winning project in the last edition of the Nur call for entries and forms part of the PhotoEspaña Festival of 2023.

A sustainable future for all societies will depend upon a well-rooted, respectful human relationship with the natural world. In the Arab world, the challenge of maintaining this balance has been compounded by political instability, overly intensive agriculture and construction, deforestation, the diversion of waterways and, more recently, the global climate emergency.

Shifting Sands presents five interrelated projects by award-winning young photographers from North Africa and the Middle East, each with a powerful creative vision that poetically addresses similar issues in their respective territories and environments for different reasons and purposes. Many layers of personal and collective history and memory have left marks behind on the landscapes we inhabit, in both their natural state and those altered by man. Rapid population growth and urbanization have ushered in dramatic changes to a variety of native environments and habitats.

These transformations displace ancient communities and lead to significant social, geopolitical and environmental repercussions. Each of the five projects in the exhibition contains a call to action: how we can use the land sustainably, ensure the conservation of biodiversity and clean water supplies, respect traditional ways of life while moving forward and embracing modernity, thus maintaining our sacred bond with Mother Nature. Mixing photography, poetry, embroidery, calligraphy, sound, found objects, archival material, and analogue and digital processes, the work presented at Casa Árabe is visually rich and compelling, while also containing powerful ecological messages.

David Drake

Curator

Shifting Sands is the project which won the NUR نور (Light) call for entries organized for the third year in a row by Casa Árabe and PHotoESPAÑA to increase the visibility and awareness of photographic works which provide a new look at various aspects of Arab societies. The selected exhibition includes works by photographers Amina Kadous, Wafaa Samir and Rehab Eldalil (Egypt), Seif Kousmate (Morocco) and Nadia Bseiso (Jordan).

The opening ceremony will be held on Thursday, June 1 at 8:00 p.m. in the Hall of Columns at Casa Árabe (at Calle Alcalá 62, basement level). Before the event, we will be holding a round table discussion titled “Shifting Sands: A meeting with artists,” at 7:00 p.m. in the Auditorium.