Artist, director and poet Hind Shoufani insists that her Palestinian-ness is a political act. “It is a choice to be on this side of history,” she tells me, “whether we triumph or not, whether I carry some piece of identification paper with blue colours on it, or green colours on it, or rainbow glitter tie-dye on it.”
Middle East Monitor has just published my interview with Hind Shoufani.
Here is the link to the interview
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Among the different research I’m currently conducting around different themes and places in contemporary art, one of the interest trail in Italian colonialism in North Africa.
I have written some pieces about Italian colonialism in Libya, and now I looked at Ethiopia and Eritrea with Eritrean-born artist Dawit L. Petros.
He has focused for over a decade on a critical re-reading of colonialism. His artworks aim for an introspective and textured analysis of the historical factors that determined migrations, and his practice always includes extensive research on the field.
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Middle East Monitor has just published my interview with Lena Merhej, Karen Keyrouz and Barrack Rima, members of the Lebanese comics collective Samandal
Here is the link to the article
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It’s always a privilege to be able to interview cultural figures I have been admiring for a long time. Since my first inception to Singapore, I wowed at the green architecture of the firm WOHA.
Thanks to a virtual show at Gajah Gallery, I have found out WOHA’s founder Richard Hassell is also an art lover and collector. He curated the show Complex Humour highlighting works by I GAK Murniasih and Yunizar.
Both artists present humourous works overlaid with much more difficult themes, as well as tribal elements.
Here is the link to the interview
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My interview with illustrator and comic book artist Andrea Serio has just been published on the Italian webmagazine Art a Part of Culture.
I have been admiring this artist for many years, and is no exaggeration to say that his art influenced my way of looking at the landscape.
Here is the link to the interview
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The webmagazine Global Comment has just published my interview with Silvia Moresi and Claudia Comito, authors and curators of the book “Arabpop”, a deep dive into the cultural manifestations, shades and consequences of the Arab Springs.
Here is the link to the article
Read More![Whirling on site at Beit Beirut [Zena el Khalil]](https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Zena-el-Khalil-whirling-on-site-at-Beit-Beirut-e1601031138142.png?resize=1032%2C687&quality=85&strip=all&zoom=1&ssl=1)
In my research on contemporary art I started to focus a lot on the spiritual values that artists carry with them and let come through their artworks and practice – despite the many hardships they might be facing.
In this sense, the life experience of Zena El-Khalil, a wonderful artist I had the pleasure to interview for Middle East Monitor, is emblematic. We talk specifically of her way of coping with the terrible explosion that has devastated Beirut, and the way art and her spiritual practice have helped her to look for the spring to come.
Kicking off the new season of articles with this interview makes me really proud, warms my heart and encourages me to look at the struggles in life with a different perspective. Hope it will do the same for you:
Here is the link to the article
For multimedia artist Steve Sabella, these hard times require us to access the potential of our imagination in order to conjure up our collective future. His works of art reflecting the hardships of the Palestinians become universal metaphors for global rebirth.
My interview with Berlin-based Palestinian artist Steve Sabella has just been published on Middle East Monitor.
Here is the link to the interview
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The webmagazine Al-Monitor has just published my article on the exhibition “Art in the Age of Anxiety” at the Sharjah Art Foundation.
The exhibition (now postponed) looked at online technology and communications feeding existential angst. It seems more relevant than ever today amid the global fears due to the coronavirus outbreak and the extensive information available.
Here is the link to the article
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From dirty riverbanks to the shores of Venice, Yogyakarta-based artist Handiwirman Saputra tells us the story of our objects.
My interview to Handiwirman has just been published on CoBo Social.
Here is the link to the interview
The exhibition at Palestinian Museum “Glimmer of a Grove Beyond” aims to outline the links between landscape representations and historical circumstances, through the medium of political posters.
Such posters came to prominence in Palestine between the mid-1960s and late-1980s as a means of motivating and mobilising political support in the national movement and revolution, and its armed struggle.
Here is the link to the article
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How to talk about spiritual matters in a highly secularised, hyper-pragmatic society? This was the question artists exhibiting in the show “Pneuma: Of Spirituality in Contemporary Age” at the Stamford Art Centre in Singapore grappled with during the 2020 Singapore Art Week.
The webmagazine Qantara has just published my piece on the show.
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Naima Morelli is an arts writer and journalist specialized in contemporary art from Asia-Pacific and the MENA region.
She has written for the Financial Times, Al-Jazeera, The Art Newspaper, ArtAsiaPacific, Internazionale and Il Manifesto, among others, and she is a regular contributor to Plural Art Mag, Middle East Monitor and Middle East Eye as well as writing curatorial texts for galleries.
She is the author of three books on Southeast Asian contemporary art.
Reach out: contact [at] naimamorelli.com
