Description
by Nada Elia
Sublime landscapes, tranquil urban scenes, frolicking children; who would associate such images with Palestine? All too often, the Western media shows only the country’s gloomy side, and Palestinians as aggressors. For this book, the Dutch designer Annelys de Vet invited Palestinian artists, photographers and designers to map their country as they see it. Given their closeness to the subject, this has resulted in unconventional, very human impressions of the landscape and the architecture, the cuisine, the music and the poetry of thought and expression. The drawings, photographs, maps and narratives made for this atlas reveal individual life experiences, from preparing chickpeas to a manual on water pipe smoking, from historic dress to modern music. Humorous and caustic newspaper cartoons and invented Palestinian currency accompany colorful cultural diaries and moving letters from prisoners. Together, these contributions give an entirely different angle on a nation in occupied territory.
The Subjective Atlas of Palestine is an initiative of the Department for Democratisation and Peacebuilding of ICCO in the Netherlands and Dutch designer Annelys de Vet. The publication, that started with a workshop was made possible in close collaboration with the International Academy of Arts, Palestine. In April 2007 three Dutch designers and an artist visited the Academy to work with more than two dozen Palestinian designers, artists, photographers, architects and students.
EDITOR: Annelys de Vet
CURATOR: Khaled Hourani (International Academy of Arts Palestine)
CONTRIBUTORS: Sameh Abboushi, Majd Abdel Hamid, Senan Abdelqader, Mohammed Amous, Tayseer Barakat, Sami Bandak, Baha Boukhari, Mahmoud Darwish (poem), Reem Fadda, Shadi Habib Allah, Majdi Hadid, Shuruq Harb, Dima Hourani, Khaled Hourani Munther Jaber, Khaled Jarrar, Abed Al Jubeh, Hassan Khader (foreword), Yazan Khalili, Suleiman Mansour, Basel Al Maqousi, Sani P. Meo, Inas Moussa, Hafez Omar, Hosni Radwan, Awatef Rumiyah, Ahmad Saleem, Shareef Sarhan, Majed Shala, Sami Shana’ah, Maissoon Sharkawi, Mamoun Shrietch, Lena Sobeh, Mohanad Yaqubi, Inass Yassin
010 Publishers, 2007
