Daily Images of Chaotic Events

Ahmed Nagy’s series, Daily Images of Chaotic Events, was created in response to poetic theatre texts written by Habibah Sheikh, a nomadic performance artist originally from Lebanon, and the curator of the Mitli Mitlak exhibition. In the text, a character named Ruba experiences the destruction of war firsthand and becomes a refugee in the process.

The series is based on pictures Nagy took with a cell phone, in the street during the Egyptian revolution. Daily Images of Chaotic Events is a cell phone capturing the Egyptian revolution. “I utilize what was happening in Egypt, and apply it as a formula to make artworks. In Egypt, what happened was fighting in the street. Through my artwork, I don’t have political say. The art itself is a great political action. When I am inspired by the streets I create something new," says Nagy.

In Act 1, Scene 2, Mitli Mitlak (Like You, Like Me), this series of photos depicts the view from the window of a young couple’s apartment during war. Much like Nagy, the couple in Mitli Mitlak are poetic young artists who apply their own experiences during the war in the hopes that their art will enable truth to shine through the cracks of every day chaotic reality:

Act 1, Scene 2, Mitli Mitlak (Like You, Like Me)

Carlos: as the disappearance of reality...when there is no ruling body...the disappearance of our objectified self because ...the nonexistent social field. Our subjectivity is all there is...We collide in time. A deep meaning can arise when society is broken by war.

Ruba: (singing) Reality is not functioning. There is no social field. Watermoon. Thoughts in silence. Ideas of collective memories, global thinking overviews. Points of view. Watermoon. In my mind..on opaque screen...horizontality explained by the sea; writing on the water. In my dream, the sky is lit, the meaning of being..what is it?! Creation and destruction hand in hand. Watermoon. The Theory of Chaos, How to become the butterfly of yourself?