Untitled 2

This work was created in response to poetic texts written by Habibah Sheikh, a nomadic performance artist originally from Lebanon, and the curator of the exhibition, Mitli Mitlak (Like You, Like Me). In the text, a character named Ruba experiences the destruction of war firsthand and becomes a refugee in the process. This work uses the imagery of violence to evoke the emotional and physical vulnerability of certain Mediterranean themes...such as being without asylum.

Act 1, Scene 3, Mitli Mitlak (Like You, Like Me):

The fury
Is uprising! Uprising!
Our crying brains..
The anxiety uprising
The fury! It is uprising to our necks
makes our chests concave
because it’s as though
We have accomplished nothing.
Nothing in all these years.
Fury! Because it doesn’t matter
to any, the hard work.
Nor how it was built
on the highest mountain.

Sudden deep breath
scared to death
begging in fury
Uprising!
the suppressed grief
is uprising..
between our ribs
as though we’ve been punched.
Feels like a knife
in the center of our heads
that makes the thorax tremble
and places a smile of deep anguish on our lips

It makes our shoulders pull up.
The fury uprising makes our intestines harden
makes our crane and face tight.
The uprising is in our membranes and cavities.
The fury numbs our fingertips..
numbs our flesh..