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Entry into this household is strictly prohibited under any circumstances, as is the construction or alteration of furniture or the construction of a new home or project, unless written permission is granted by the owner of the blue bag, and 2020
Soft sculpture
Commissioned by How to reappear (MMAG Foundation, Amman)
Commissioned by How to reappear (MMAG Foundation, Amman)
Walter Benjamin says, “We collect books in the belief that we are preserving them when in fact it is the books that preserve their collector.”
As fate has it, the papers, published in 1991, end up in their home within the blue bag in Amman. All photographs, texts and shelves inside said bag have since expired. All that remains is Batoul Hammoud’s imagined drawing, hinting at a project in 2020, coincidentally also about the shape of the home in Amman.Within a home, isolated, that declares itself the heart of blue ink, the overly romantic texts, the violence and the books are able to embrace themselves and move far away from you.
Occasionally, this bag is the home and memory and exhibition that really exists. But you cannot pass through it: The size of this bag is determined by the size of how much of this memory you can recall, not the size of individuals. To enter its heart, you must be of equal size to the texts’ memories, which dissipate from Baghdad to Beirut to Abu Dhabi, leaving nothing behind except for this notebook and this bag.
You could be inside this bag. To return, briefly, to memories, we must return to what has taken place on walls in Abu Dhabi, before it is forgotten.
Our project is, once again, complete. Not in the sense that it is incredible, or perfect, or even entreating. However, it is the first self-publishing project resisted to an emotional and political context, with documents from an imagination so exceedingly romantic that it might be invisible.
Concealed, retreated, and hidden from him, he changed his clothes and disguised himself.
Exhibition view, Villa Qawar, MMAG Foundation.
As fate has it, the papers, published in 1991, end up in their home within the blue bag in Amman. All photographs, texts and shelves inside said bag have since expired. All that remains is Batoul Hammoud’s imagined drawing, hinting at a project in 2020, coincidentally also about the shape of the home in Amman.Within a home, isolated, that declares itself the heart of blue ink, the overly romantic texts, the violence and the books are able to embrace themselves and move far away from you.
Occasionally, this bag is the home and memory and exhibition that really exists. But you cannot pass through it: The size of this bag is determined by the size of how much of this memory you can recall, not the size of individuals. To enter its heart, you must be of equal size to the texts’ memories, which dissipate from Baghdad to Beirut to Abu Dhabi, leaving nothing behind except for this notebook and this bag.
You could be inside this bag. To return, briefly, to memories, we must return to what has taken place on walls in Abu Dhabi, before it is forgotten.
Our project is, once again, complete. Not in the sense that it is incredible, or perfect, or even entreating. However, it is the first self-publishing project resisted to an emotional and political context, with documents from an imagination so exceedingly romantic that it might be invisible.
Concealed, retreated, and hidden from him, he changed his clothes and disguised himself.
Exhibition view, Villa Qawar, MMAG Foundation.