Record, Reproduce, Record...

by Nora Akawi, for 'Scenographies of Power' curated by Maite López-Pastor, La Casa Encendida, Madrid, 09/17

Facing incessant destruction, looting, and denial, Palestinians have maintained a steadfast resistance against the project of erasure and forgetting employed by Israeli settler-colonialism. Rituals and classes, theatres and photographs, walks and ruins, melodies and stories are all mobilized for the spectres of memory to stay woke.

In States of Fantasy, Jacqueline Rose writes that it is precisely that memory evaded, that archive burned, that place destroyed, that evidence buried which returns to haunt. In Capture Practice and Archive, Arkadi Zaides’ work becomes the channel through which collectively evaded memories are not only captured and inscribed, but also displaced, abstracted and released in their most haunting form; undeniable, indestructible.

Between the collective and the Individual: The Israeli body as a site of conflict and resistance

by Zohar Yanko, 07/17

A few months ago I went to see Capture Practice, a video installation by Arkadi Zaides featured at the Festival Temps d'Images, Lisbon. Standing in the big old palace in Principe Real with some of my colleagues from school, we were all seemingly observing the same thing: on the left screen images of humans in a conflict zone, on the right -the performer translated those images simultaneously into body language, using his movements to draw a cartography of conflict, violence and pain.

Right-wing Protesters Attack Art Talk in Jerusalem

by Yonatan Amir & Ronen Eidelman, Hyperallergic Online Magazine, 11/15

WEST JERUSALEM — In retrospect, we were complacent. We thought that the opposition would fade away by the time of the event, or at most, the action would amount to a polite protest vigil. Even after seeing the distorted stories claiming that our event supported terrorism and called for the destruction of Israel we were relatively calm. We are accustomed to this language — the lies and distortions of the nationalist right in Israel.

But when invitations for a demonstration against our event started appearing on the Facebook pages of extremist organizations the management of the Hansen House hired six security guards and notified the police. The night of the event, Monday, November 10, there were roughly 50 people inside to attend our event, while others were left outside after the guards locked the gates as a safety precaution. When police arrived, they recognized some of the protesters — and they suspected things may turn violent — so the police officers stayed at the scene and called for backup.