Aglaia and Abdulaziz
The 5th Chapter is realized in Beirut in collaboration
with Syrian refugee women from the Association Basmeh y
Zeitooneh in Shatila and Art Residency Aley, supported
by the Swiss Embassy of Lebanon. This itinerant project
was first carried out in Cairo in 2013, then in 2014 in
Rabat, Casablanca, Marrakech.
It is a fragile moment for the Mediterranean and all
over the world, socially and politically. The crisis has
brought into question the lack of fundamental values and
organizations, not to mention art in dialogue with the
civil society, particularly with women. It is this
context in relation to the question of what ‘resistance’
means and how we might perform it that is the subjects
of our project.
“Embroiderers of Actuality” http://embroiderers-of-actuality.com/
is an action that aims to be a sensible provocation: a
visual discussion about the position of women in the
society. As an exchange between local populations and
artists, its purpose is to map diversities of (feminine)
resistance within the realities of the Global South. The
project uses texts of art, poetry and literature,
written by local women, and employs embroidery as a form
of folk craftsmanship that speaks to notions of
belonging, tradition and participation. Through this,
the project aims to provide an opportunity for women to
express their voice and to improve their socio-economic
situation, since the embroidery work is paid, thereby
generating an additional source of income
In this sense, “Embroiderers of Actuality” is also a
confrontation and a statement between yesterday and
today, between politics and religion, between modernity
and tradition. Art is used here as a tool to realize a
dialogue between the local population and artists. This
situation questions contemporary art as such, as a
possibility or necessity to bring art into the public
sphere. This dialogue will develop, confront and
stimulate the research for the artist (conceptual and
formal) and will be, at the same time, a medium of
communication, working in the intersection between the
private sphere and the public one.