Tags archives: ARTiFairiti
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6 years ago
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It was social critic Edward W. Said who termed Orientalism as the post-colonial tendency to personify the "Arab and Eastern cultures as exotic, distorted, uncivilized and at times dangerous." It is through this faulty lens that the Eastern and Arab cultures continue struggling to legitimize their position in social structures of acceptance and understandings from the West and Eurocentric cultures.
Regretfully, although one would like to assume the art world as tolerant of "others" in its reich; evidence proves otherwise, displaying very little or vague opportunities for artists residing in the East ( dominantly Arab ) to exhibit their work on US soils. This year, in 2018, marked the first-ever solo exhibition of a self-taught Algerian artist Baya Mahieddine (1931–1998), at New York University’s Grey Art Gallery.
Back in Algeria the struggle to be seen outside the Orientalist perspective continues with a swath of renegade artists and curators: searching for ways to break the stereotype artforms and infrastructures by conducting new alternative run spaces and bridging communications with foreigners. These quads not only present the art of local contemporary artists but rather invite international voices to coexist in a place that offers a compound exchange of ideas, open forum, and cultural exchange with Algerian artists working on the edge of their medium. One of those spaces, BOX24, now in its ten-year anniversary is lead by its founding visionary leader, Walid Aidoud.
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6 years ago
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Federico Guzmán (AKA Fiko) has become an iconic figure in Western Sahara, utilizing the platform art offers as a vehicle to promote peace and social change to the Saharawi people. Guzmán treads between a soldier of solidarity and curator of cultures emphasizing on gatherings, art, and experiences that will induce an exchange of ideas and collaborations between artists and wherever his projects realize, and the local community.
For twelve years Guzmán has co-organized ARTifariti The Arts and Human Rights Encounters of Western Sahara in the African desert "as a way to explain the circumstances of the Saharawi people " creating a "weapon of visibility" to a story not globally known by many nor should be hidden from the public eye: and with projects such as ARTifariti one sees the opportunity to include foreign narratives and artists distanced by unfavorable political circumstances into the art world”.
The selected artists demonstrate couth in human rights and its relevance within the arts, but more importantly "are confronted a reality" that is life-changing from personal to professional, receiving a surreal cultural exchange with fresh perspectives and resilient power from the Sahawari people (especially from the matriarch figure whose role is to lead the community).
During 2018's visitation in the Sahara, the artists delve into intense creative processes of art-making, finally exhibiting and documenting the work(s). Collaborations are accessible on the list of act[...]
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