Friday March 29th, 2024
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Egypt Pushes Peace with Venice Biennale Art Piece

One of the most anticipated annual art events on the global calendar, the Venice Biennale features and impressive and technology-fueled installation by three Egyptian artists.

Staff Writer

The Venice Biennale, i.e. major bi-annual contemporary art exhibition for those of you not familiar with the art world, is taking place at the moment in the water-soaked Italian city. Om el donya is representing at this artsy endeavour with an installation titled Can You See? The piece was created by three artists; Ahmed Abdel Fatah, Maher Dawoud, and Gamal Elkheshen, and Hany Al Ashkar is serving as commissioner.

The installation features a lot of astroturf with ramps and such, and kind of looks like that thing in dog shows where the pooch has to run up and down and show off their tricks and discipline and whatnot. Or like an architectural model/mockup you’d see at some kind of corporate development conference, where people go ooooh, that’s what the new city/park/building/mall will look like! But it’s not. The installation is interactive; a series of Samsung tablets are set up on stands, with their cameras angled at a logo on the plastic grass that reads ‘Peace’ in Arabic writing as well as the Latin alphabet. When you point the tablets at the logo, they show a virtual version of the room as if it’s in real time. There are buttons you can push on the tablets; press on the plus signs and they add bunnies and butterflies and flowers to the scenario; minus signs make all the happy things disappear and replace them with cockroaches, tarantulas, before the whole thing just sets itself on fire. Moral of the story guys: positive action will push the country forward on the wings of a butterfly! Negative action, wel balad kollaha 7atwalla3.

The art piece is curated by Egypt's Ministry of Culture. Considering this, it might be some form of propaganda featuring messages of hope and positivity. After all, Sisi is all about great lofty ideals and moving speeches. 

Photos courtesy of artsy.net