Ala Younis
Ala Younis | |
---|---|
Born | 1974 (age 49–50) |
Nationality | Kuwaiti |
Alma mater | University of Jordan |
Known for | Painting |
Website | alayounis |
Ala Younis is a research-based artist and curator, based in Amman. Younis initiates journeys in archives and narratives, and reinterprets collective experiences that have collapsed into personal ones. Through research, she builds collections of objects, images, information, narratives, and notes on why/how people tell their stories. Her practice is based on found material, and on creating materials when they cannot be found or when they do not exist.
Early life and education
Born in Kuwait in 1974 to a Kuwaiti family of Palestinian descent, Younis moved to Amman in 1984. She graduated as an architect from the University of Jordan in 1997. She holds a Masters in Research in Visual Cultures from Goldsmiths, University of London.
Career
Younis has produced art installations, video works, publications, temporary collectives, publishing projects, and curated exhibitions. Her curatorial projects include Kuwait's first national pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2013, the nomadic collection of Museum of Manufactured Response to Absence, and "An Index of Tensional and Unintentional Love of Land" at New Museum in the context of "Here and Elsewhere" exhibition organized in 2014. Her work was shown at the Institute du Monde Arabe (2013), 9th Gwangju Biennial (2012), Museum of Modern Arab Art in Doha (2012), New Museum Triennial (2012), 12th Istanbul Biennial (2011), Home Works '5 Beirut (2010), The Jerusalem Show (2009), PhotoCairo 4 (2008) and other places.
Her publication projects include 'Needles to Rockets' (2009), 'Tin Soldiers' (2012), and the non-profit publishing initiative Kayfa-ta, a series of cost-effective Arabic monographs on how to, co-founded with artist
Curatorial projects
In 2013, for Kuwait's first national pavilion at the 55th
This show followed her curated "Museum of Manufactured Response to Absence (MoMRtA)"[5] which premiered at Museum of Modern Art in Kuwait and Museum of Modern in 2012. Initiated and produced by MinRASY Projects, the museum is a nomadic collection of commissioned objects that respond to the absence of Palestinians and their history from Kuwait, each object of which is an impossibility or exaggeration. The show premiered at Kuwait's Museum of Modern Art in May 2012.[6]
Her other curatorial projects include:
- "An Index of Tensional and Unintentional Love of Land" exhibition set within "Here and Elsewhere" exhibition at New Museum in New York, 2014
- "This land first speaks to you in signs", exhibition of archival materials and some films from the collection of Cimatheque, Cairo and Berlin, 2015
- "The closest I've ever come to a scientific experiment", at the project space of Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha, 2014[7]
- "Covering One's Back", a photography exhibition co-curated with Maha Maamoun, Gezira Art Center, Cairo, 2013[8]
- "The Crowd Behind Us", presented at three venues within the Image Festival in Amman, 2012
- "Momentarily Learning from Mega-Events" at Makan art space, Amman, 2011
- "Outre mesure et programmes radio" at La Galeriem Noisy-Le-Sec, Paris, 2011[9]
- "Out of Place", co-curated with Kasia Redzisz for Tate Modern and Darat al Funun's collaboration project, presented at both institutions in 2011.[10]
Art projects
Her projects begin with found objects and images that might initially seem odd or intriguing, for instance Nefertiti (2008) is an installation of video and defunct sewing machines (Nefertiti) that were produced and sold in Egypt after the 1952 revolution, and were among the country's plan to nationalize industrial production and to create productive symbols of Egyptian sovereignty.[11] The manufacture of Nefertiti was discontinued in the 1980s, due to various flaws in the design.[12] "For Younis, its manufacture was a 'feminist project' that, although it confined women to the domestic space, also, 'aimed at empowering Egyptian housewives, since it gave them a chance to earn money while their husbands were away fighting'. Yet once the old, elegant, curvaceous Nefertiti was retired, the market was flooded with aesthetically inferior Western machines. The Nefertiti became a focus for nostalgia, and this video explores people's attachment to their old sewing machines."[12]
Her found objects become part of a web of stories in which the personal is inextricable from the collective, like in the publication version of "Tin Soldiers" (2010–2) which is made of text and image portraits of contemporary (in)formal Middle Eastern soldiers, and the virtual and alternative spaces they practice their version of militarism in. "Tin Soldiers" is also an installation of 12,265 metal figurines depicting nine armies of the Middle East. The project was produced and shown at HomeWorks 5 in Beirut (2010) and at the Istanbul Biennial (2011).[13] The publication version was also installed as an exhibition at the New Museum Triennial[14] and at the Gwangju Biennial, both took place in 2012.
"UAR" (2014) is a series, of drawings and found objects, that studies the stories and mechanisms that produced Gamal Abdel Nasser's historical figure in the time of the United Arab Republic (1958–1971). The project starts from a photograph of Nasser looking onto an enthusiastic and proud Arab crowd during the signing of a sovereign union agreement between Egypt and Syria in 1958.[15]
Oraib Toukan and Ala Younis collaborate on exploring film footage, discarded by the former Soviet Friendship Society in Amman. They both "developed a peculiar archeology of research that looks at early Palestinian film production, technocratic Soviet friendships, cine clubs, and Russian language films in Amman."[16] Their 3-minute film from this research, titled "From the impossibility of one page being like the other", was broadcast on Channel 4 (UK) at New York Film Festival in 2014.
Her project "Plan for Greater Baghdad" was selected for "All the World's Futures" curated by
Younis received the 2nd prize at the 17th Youth Salon, Painting for Non Egyptians, in Cairo (2005); and the 3rd Prize at the Annual Exhibition of Jordanian Artists Association in Amman (2005). In 2012 she was selected by Christine Tohme as one of ArtReview's 'Future Greats 2012'.[18]
Selected exhibitions
2015: -All the World's Futures, 56th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, curated by Okwui Enwezor, Venice[19]
2014: – New York Film Festival, New York – Here and Elsewhere, exhibition curated by Massimiliano Gioni and team, New Museum, New York. Participation took the form of a curated exhibition at the 5th floor titled "An Index of Tensional and Unintentional Love of Land"[20] – Multitude, Sesc Pompeia, São Paulo – Tea with Nefertiti, Staatliches Museum Ägyptischer Kunst, Munich – UAR, solo exhibition at Gypsum Gallery, Cairo – Meeting Points 7, Ten thousand wiles and a hundred thousand tricks, Cairo, Hong Kong, Beirut, Antwerp and Zaghreb
2013: – Tea with Nefertiti, IVAM Instituto Valenciano de Arte Moderno, Valencia; Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris; Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha – 59th International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, Lichtburg Filmpalast, Oberhausen
2012: – ROUNDTABLE, 9th Gwangju Biennial, curated by Nancy Adajania – The Ungovernables, exhibition curated by Eunjie Joo, New Museum Triennial, New York – A Gathering, curated by Maria-Thalia Carras and Olga Hatzidaki, Athens – London Palestine Film Festival, London
2011: – Untitled (12th Istanbul Biennial), curated by Adriano Pedrosa and Jens Hoffman, Istanbul
2010: – Home Works 5’, forum and exhibition curated by Christine Tohme, Beirut Art Center, Beirut – Solo exhibition at Delfina Foundation, London
2009: Solo exhibition at Darat al Funun, Amman
2008: – PhotoCairo 4: The Long Shortcut, curated by Aleya Hamza and Edit Molnar, Hungarian Cultural Center, Cairo – The Third International Biennale for the Artist's Book 2008, Bibliotheca Alexandrina
Publications
Ala Younis published "Needles to Rockets"[21] with Motaz Attalla in 2009. The publication collects personal responses to questions that emerge around the place of consumer products in the lives of people and in society at large in Egypt. The people's answers illustrate how objects become iconic and acquire personas, and they tell some of the myths that surround them. The publication is named after Gamal Abdel Nasser's famous slogan of industrial promise.
References
- ^ "Kayfa ta كيف تـ". kayfa-ta.com. Retrieved 7 January 2021.
- ^ Bellagio Creative Arts Fellows, " Archived 23 January 2015 at the Wayback Machine, Retrieved 28 March 2015.
- ^ Website of "Kuwait's Pavilion at La Biennale di Venezia, 2013" Archived 20 June 2017 at the Wayback Machine, Retrieved 20 March 2015.
- ^ Taking Venice for the world, by Kaelen Wilson-Goldie, The Daily Star on 11 June 2013, page 16 in printed version [1]
- ^ "MoMRtA". Archived from the original on 24 March 2018. Retrieved 11 June 2020.
- ^ Museum of Manufactured Response to Absence, web review by Isabella Ellaheh Hughes for ArtAsiaPacific, June 2012 [2]
- ^ http://www.mathaf.org.qa/en/exhibitions-list/222-ghadah Archived 5 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Covering One's Back at Gezira Art Center, Cairo, by Jenifer Evans for Ibraaz, published on 27 June 2013 [3]
- ^ Outre mesures et programmes radio at La Galerie
- ^ Project Space: Out of Place, Tate Modern "Project Space: Out of Place"
- ^ Ala Younis – Nefertiti "Exhibition: Ala Younis – Nefertiti"
- ^ OCLC 819938421.
- ^ Istanbul Biennial embraces Middle East, Hurriyet Daily News, Istanbul, 2011 [4]
- ^ Quiet Disobedience, by Holland Cotter, New York Times, 16 Feb 2012
- ^ Tracing the past: Exhibition explores representations of Nasser, by Sara Elkamel, Ahram Online, published on 22 May 2014 [5]
- ^ From the impossibility of one page being like the other
- ^ "Six AFAC Grantees at the Venice Biennale – 28 Apr, 2015". Archived from the original on 26 March 2016. Retrieved 11 May 2015.
- ^ Future Great 2012, selected by Christine Tohme
- ^ La Biennale – Artists "La Biennale – Artists" Archived 2 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Nafas Art Magazine "An Index of Tensional and Unintentional Love of Land, by Ala Younis"
- ^ "Needles to Rockets". www.alayounis.com. Archived from the original on 3 July 2017. Retrieved 30 April 2016.