In a time marked by urgency, scarcity, resilience, and hope for Gaza, Arab Women Artist Now (AWAN), in collaboration with Architects for Gaza, will bring together architects from the Arab world.
The exhibition reconstructs the reality of the besieged, fractured Gazan landscape. Arab women architects employ architecture, drawings, and visual media as tools to narrate, heal, reinterpret and revive the identity of the city.
With a foot on the earth and a hand in the sky – their work attempts to both reclaim the city and asserts Gazan’s right to return to their homes.
In this talk, we will explore several questions while thinking and re-reading Gaza:
- Why is it important to reimagine and dream?
- How to deal with a city when the whole fabric has collapsed?
- How to rethink the notion of home when the relationship between street, neighbourhood and room is blurred?
- Can we re-read emptiness, ruins, and rubble as powerful symbols of resilience, transformation, and memory?
- Can we see them as canvases for rebuilding and reimagining?
Speakers and Panellists:
Minerva Fadel (PhD Candidate) – The notion of home, and the significance of materials and materiality within the context of memory, culture, and colonialism
Hala Alnaji (PhD Candidate) – with a Foot on Earth and a Hand in the Sky, how can mapping and counter-mapping offer a new reading towards reconstruction?
Zein Elsharaf Wahbeh
Muna Dajani
Luma Darakeh
The panel talk will be followed by a discussion moderated by Samir Pandya and Dr Nasser Golzari from the University of Westminster