Another Day in Baghdad – Iraqi women tell their stories

Maysoon Pachachi and crew members

A couple of weeks ago, I went to a wonderful event at the Royal Court Theatre in London: a fundraiser for “Another Day in Baghdad”, a film, which tells the story of post-invasion Iraq from a women’s perspective and that of ordinary citizens. It is the first ever-Iraqi feature film authored by Iraqi women - and it unites cast and crew from the Middle East and Europe.

The fundraiser started with a short documentary about the recent test shoot (which you can view here), followed by a reading of part of the film’ script by 14 actors, including, to my delight, the mesmerizing Ben Whishaw and Lizzie Wells (Matilda The Musical).   

I was deeply moved by the script, but also the aim of the film and the way it is being developed – and since they still need to raise £19,600 in order to be able to film in Iraq and support Iraqi talent, I wanted to help spread the word.

 

“Another Day in Baghdad” is based on journal notes and the real life experiences of the two female authors - Irada Al Jabbouri, a Baghdad-based novelist, and Maysoon Pachachi, a London-based filmmaker of Iraqi origin.  The film tells the intersecting stories of ordinary citizens, unfolding in the last week of 2006 in Baghdad. All the characters are Iraqi and many are strong female ones.  

“The time of extreme sectarian violence in which our story takes place foreshadows what is happening in Iraq and the Middle East at the moment,” says Pachachi. “We feel that in the context of the extreme militarized male violence we are seeing in the Middle East, it is crucial to have stories told from a female perspective.

 “These stories are absent in the media and absent from the conscience of the world. Iraq has been presented for decades as a source of evil and cruelty and a threat to its neighbours and the world,” Pachachi adds.  “We feel that it’s especially important now for stories of individual resistance and hope to be told about the area, where so many still maintain solidarity with one another as human beings, in spite of the intensely divisive pressures of religion and politics, with which they are living.”

Co-written by Pachachi and Al Jabbouri, the script won the IWC Schaffhausen Script Award – presented by Cate Blanchett in 2012.

Pachachi and Al Jabbouri have secured the funding needed for filming in Jordan, as well as for the post-production of the film in Europe, but are now raising funds to shoot in Baghdad - where the light and the river are irreplaceable - and hire Iraqi cast and crew.  Part of the film will also be shot in Jordan with Iraqi refugee actors.  

“For Iraqis inside and outside Iraq, opportunities to shape their own narratives – far from Hollywood-style fiction and newscasts – are limited. Through this film, we aim to generate an authentic and meaningful opportunity for Iraqi actors and filmmakers." Pachachi says.

In 2004, she co-founded a free film-training centre in Baghdad and has taught film directing and editing in Britain and Palestine. 

If you want to support this project, you can contribute here.

Imprisoning the victims – Jordan places abused women in “protective custody”

Credit: Equal Rights Trust

In Jordan, a country with a reputation of being progressive, women and girls who go to the police to report abuse or honour crimes, often end up being the ones thrown in jail.  Instead of prosecuting their abusers, the police place them in “protective custody” – a common practice in the country, seemingly to protect women from gender-based violence.

The practice not only fails to protect women, but further exacerbates the harm they experience and allows perpetrators to act with impunity, according to a damning new report by the Equal Rights Trust, which urges civil society and the Jordanian authorities to end the practice.

The report, Shouting Through the Walls, documents instances where women were detained for up to 10 years and only released with the support of a male relative or husband, an extremely dangerous practice in domestic violence cases.  Indeed, the report cites cases of women being killed upon release by male relatives, despite guarantees of their safety. And women who don’t have a husband are kept until they can find one. “The Governor is insisting I need to have a husband [to be released], but where am I supposed to find a one when I am locked up?” one women in protective custody said.

The practice is also used to detain foreign women who have been trafficked or who have left their employer’s home because the employer abused them.

Women in “protective" custody's situation is grim: they are detained without having committed any crime, often following significant violence or threats of violence. They have no prospect of release nor any real ability to influence their release. Not surprisingly, they are more likely to experience psychological problems than women in judicial detention. According to a 2014 Penal Reform International survey undertaken at Jordan’s Juweida prison, 62% of women in “protective custody” suffered form depression and a quarter have self harmed and had suicidal thoughts.

The report also paints a bleak picture of the conditions in jail, including overcrowding, a lack of access to healthcare, poor hygiene and few opportunities for work.

There are very little data about this practice, which exists also in other countries, but figures from the National Centre for Human Rights (2015) showed that nearly half of women prisoners in Jordan are administrative detainees.  Despite its reputation as a progressive state, Jordan ranks low on gender equality and women’s rights amongst world’s countries. 

 

What drives young Syrians into ISIS?

Young Syrian refugees in Lebanon/Russell Watkins DFID

More than ideologies, it is poverty, desperation and desire for revenge that drive young Syrians into extremist groups.

A new study by the peacebuilding NGO International Alert shows that the key factors that push young Syrians into joining extremist groups are the need to earn a basic living, regain a sense of purpose and dignity, and the belief in a moral duty to protect, avenge and defend their people.

The study, titled Why young Syrians choose to fight: Vulnerability to recruitment by violent extremist groups, draws on interviews with 311 young Syrians, their families and community members in Syria, Lebanon and Turkey, to understand what drives both vulnerability and resilience to recruitment by the groups ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra (Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria).

Adolescent boys and young men between the ages of 12 and 24 were found to be most at risk, along with children and young adults not in education, internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees without supportive family structures and networks.

The findings suggest that radicalisation is not an explanation for joining a violent extremist group per se. For many young Syrians, belief in extreme ideologies appears to be, at most, a secondary factor in the initial decision to join an extremist group. 

Instead, vulnerability is driven by a combination of extreme trauma, loss and displacement, lack of alternative ways to make a decent living, the collapse of social structures and institutions including education, and the desire to get revenge against the regime of President Bashar Al-Assad. According to respondents, armed groups also provide a strong sense of purpose, honour and self-worth.

As one young Syrian man in Lebanon said: “People can find a new meaning to their life in extremism. Extremism opens a door to a new life where they are wanted.”

In Syria more than 6,000 schools are out of use, having been attacked, occupied by the military or turned into an emergency shelter. The collapse of the education system, with some two million children out of school, has also greatly contributed to young people’s vulnerability to joining violent extremist groups, who are filling this gap by providing their own forms of education, the report says. These ‘schools’ are highly segregated, exploit sectarian divisions and support divisive narratives.

UNICEF, which today unveiled details of a major new fund (Education Cannot Wait) to help get children back in class during emergencies, also stresses the crucial role of education in countries affected by wars and disasters.  

"Education changes lives in emergencies," said Josephine Bourne, UNICEF's education chief, in a statement. "Going to school keeps children safe from abuses like trafficking and recruitment into armed groups."

Yet, only 2 percent of global humanitarian appeals are on average dedicated to education.  "It is time education is prioritised by the international community as an essential part of basic humanitarian response, alongside water, food and shelter," Bourne added.

Offering comprehensive, inclusive and quality education, which also incorporates trauma healing and psychosocial support, was one of the four key factors identified by the report that can prevent recruitment.  The others were: providing alternative sources of livelihood, better access to positive social groups and institutions, and avenues for exercising non-violent activism.

The report stresses the need to integrate these social cohesion efforts into humanitarian aid projects, regional policy objectives and diplomacy aiming to reduce discrimination against refugees, which can also drive recruitment.

Note: The study was conducted five years into the conflict in Syria, which has claimed an estimated 300,000 lives, displaced 6.5 million people internally and prompted 4.8 million people to flee to neighbouring countries. 

You can find out more about International Alert's work in Syria here.

 

Another Day Lost - Mapping Syrian Refugee Camps

Another Day Lost: 1,579 days and counting.../Installation by Issam Kourbaj

        
 
If you live in London, make sure to see the haunting installations by my friend, Syrian-born, Cambridge-based artist Issam Kourbaj, evoking the plight of his fellow Syrians in refugee camps scattered all over Syria and neighbouring countries. The installations are part of London-wide festival, Shubbak: A Window on Contemporary Arab Culture, between 11^th July and 26^th July. 

Taking the title of a Fairouz song, these five installations by Kourbaj are inspired by and based upon refugee camps. Each installation is constructed from imagined camp waste products, such as educational material, books and medical packaging, and is encircled with a fence of 1,579 burnt matches. The matches, which increase in number over the course of the exhibition, count the irretrievable days since the Syrian uprising (15th March 2011).

Another Day Lost: 1,579 days and counting.../Installation by Issam Kourbaj

By repurposing discarded materials and extinguished matches, Kourbaj laments not only the loss of time, normality and everyday life for Syrians everywhere, but also the poor quality of life experienced by his compatriots in their displacement. The installations are scattered around central London, in a pattern that loosely relates to the diaspora of refugee camps that have arisen in the countries bordering Syria over the last four years.

" I am counting the days since the uprising; it is more than 1500 days and I am still counting. My homeland, 'the country formerly known as Syria'* is torn apart; its cities are turned to dust, millions of my fellow Syrian families, women and children are daily forced to flee this largest humanitarian crisis in the world.

Though life continues in refugee camps throughout the region, with the help of many generous organisations such as UNHCR and MSF and others, the displaced millions now bear a lasting trail of visible and invisible scars caused by the conflict, the separation from their homeland and the scars of permanent loss.
Over the last four years, I have witnessed from this painful distance the way these vulnerable human beings are waiting in makeshift shelters they call home, and I fear for their lives are on hold and many are becoming citizens of a tent. "

Kourbaj was born in Syria and studied art in Damascus and St Petersburg, before settling in the UK. He currently teaches at the University of Cambridge, where he is Lector at Christ's College. Since the 2011 revolution, Kourbaj has been making work based on the horrors of the war in Syria, raising awareness and money for projects and aid in Syria.

The catalogue of Another Day Lost is on sale at each location, with contributions by Nabil Almulhem, Paul Connerton, Tarek Fustok, Kevin Hart, Martin Johnson, Tim Knox, Issam Kourbaj, Louisa Macmillan, Polly Markandya, Bill Norris, Eva Schmitt, Eckhard Thiemann, Laurence Topham, Gonzalo Vargas Llosa and Lucy Winkett. Proceeds will go to MSF and UNHCR. You can also donate to these charities directly, as well as to preorder artworks to be made out of these installations after the exhibition finishes.


 *As described in The Economist, "Syria's civil war: The country formerly known as Syria" (23rd February, 2013).  

Another Day Lost: 1,579 days and counting.../Installation by Issam Kourbaj

Conversation with the artist St James's Church, Piccadilly Wednesday 22nd July 6:30–7:30pm Issam Kourbaj in conversation with curator Louisa Macmillan at St James's Church, Piccadilly (free, no booking required, donations most welcome)
St James's Day celebrations St James's Church, Piccadilly Sunday 26th Julyfrom 1pm Members of the public are invited to join in the deinstallation of one of the camps, with opportunity to buy some of the artworks, as part of the St James's Day celebrations at St James's Church

LOCATIONS
St James's Church
197 Piccadilly, London W1J 9LL Mon–Sat 9am–6pm. Sun 1–6pm
10 Golborne Road
10 Golborne Road, London W10 5PE Mon–Sun 10am–6pm
Goethe-Institut London
50 Princes Gate, Exhibition Road, SW7 2PH Mon–Fri 8:30am–7pm. Sat8:30am–5pm
Heath Street Baptist Church
84 Heath Street, London NW3 1DN Mon–Sun 10am–6pm
Central Books
99 Wallis Road, London E9 5LN Mon–Fri 9am–5pm. Sat 11th July 9am–5pm


-->Supported by: Goethe Institute, St James's Church Piccadilly, Heath Street Baptist Church, Central Books, Cambridge School of Visual & Performing Arts
 

Yazidi girls who escaped Islamic State are trapped by trauma

Last summer, militants from the Islamic State group attacked a small ethnic group called the Yazidis, executing men and taking thousands of women and girls as slaves. The Yazidi (or Yezidi) people are a Kurdish tribe who follow an ancient Mesopotamian pagan religion in which they worship the sun and have a spiritual connection with the land.  

Kimbal Bumstead, a young British-Dutch artist, spent some time in the Yazidi refugee camp of Batman in Turkey in October. People told him that on the 3rd August, ISIS militia came to their village and took 80 men out into the streets and told them they must convert to Islam or they will be killed. Those who refused were shot; those who accepted were also shot. They told horrific stories about their family members and friends being slaughtered and their women and girls being raped and sold into sexual slavery.  Here is his report. 

Some of the Yazidi women managed to escape from the terrorist group and are now living in huge refugee camps in Kurdistan, Northern Iraq. They are freed, but far from free, as PBS's special correspondent Marcia Biggs explains in her harrowing report. She speaks with young women in Dohuk, one of the refugee camps, about rape, violence, threats, the terrible escapes that they endured and their continuing struggles with psychological trauma and stigma - especially in a culture were rape is shameful and virginity for young women is essential.

Lebanon - Media in a polarised country

Talking with students from various universities in Beirut

I wonder how my Lebanese colleagues manage to do any meaningful work.  How do you cover the news in such a polarised country? How do you report on other views, on other religious and political convictions – especially when you work for media which are themselves so polarised? 

I went to Beirut recently with the wonderful Milica Pesic, executive director of the Media Diversity Institute (MDI), a London-based international organisation promoting and researching media diversity.  During our weeklong visit, we discussed with top Lebanese journalists, as well as journalism faculty and students from five universities, how their media could try to ease tensions rather than fuelling hostility and violence.  Our visit was part of a two-year project called “Toward an Inclusive and Responsible Media in Lebanon” run by MDI and its Lebanese partner the Maharat Foundation, an organisation working on building a more democratic society through freedom of expression.

Byblos/credit: Veronique Mistiaen

The first thing Milica and I did when arriving in Lebanon was to visit the ancient city of Byblos, one of the oldest continuously inhabited city is the world. Created 7,000 years ago, this UNESCO World Heritage Site, some 40 km north of Beirut is a true microcosm of the various civilizations which have populated Lebanon over the centuries.   We thought that regular visits to Byblos should be mandatory for students, political and religious leaders, journalists and anyone in danger of forgetting the rich, diverse past of their country.

 

Walking through the coastal city, you can see layers upon layers of ruins from previous civilisations. Here are walls built by the Phoenicians, there a tower erected by the crusaders and everywhere are traces of the various cultures, ethnic groups and languages that have made the richness of this small country.

Sadly, because of its geographical location and the brutal civil war, which was fought along religious fault lines, Lebanon’s pluralism has long been replaced by ferocious polarisation.

 

The influx of more than one million refugees from Syria is further threatening this fragile country, where one out of every four people is now a Syrian refugee. 

And over the past few years, the media have exacerbated the sectarianism and have become more polarised themselves.  Journalists we spoke with explained that newspapers and TV stations – even universities – are increasingly in the hands of political, religious and business leaders who use them as their mouthpieces and instruments of control. 

Not surprisingly, the polarisation between media has in turn reinforced Lebanon’s social and political polarisation.

In that context, the work of Maharat Foundation and partner organizations like MDI is crucial. The Foundation has designed a Reporting Diversity module to help journalists, students and academics improve their skills in reporting on religious intolerance, sectarianism and extremism. Maharat is also trying to make the media industry acknowledge their part of responsibility for this polarisation and offering guidelines for a more inclusive, ethical and responsible coverage. 

Yezidi Refugees Living in Limbo in Turkey

Children at the Yezidi refugee camp in Batman, Turkey/Credit: Kimbal Bumstead

Refugees from Iraq's Yezidi (or Yazidi) religious minority, who have fled to Turkey from the advance of jihadists, are still living in harsh conditions in refugee camps.  And many fear they will never be able to return home. 

The Yezidi refugees have fled to the southeastern Turkish province of Sirnak bordering Iraq to escape the murderous advance of Islamic State (IS) jihadists who specifically target their community.

Turkey, which is already giving sanctuary to some 1.2 million fleeing the Syria conflict, is not coping with this additional refugee influx.

Kimbal Bumstead, a young British-Dutch artist, has spent some time in the Yezidi refugee camp of Batman. Here is his report: 

Five minutes walk from “Batman Park”, a monster of a shopping mall, complete with lights that change colour, glass elevators and chocolate fondue fountains, is a disused football ground building that houses over 500 Yezidi refugees who have fled from Sinjar, Northern Iraq. They have been living there for over a month now, with three families to a room, after ISIS militia came to their village massacring those who refused to convert to Islam.

The Yezidi people are a Kurdish tribe who follow an ancient Mesopotamian pagan religion in which they worship the sun, and have a spiritual connection with the land.

Credit: Kimbal Bumpstead

I was lucky to meet two men there who spoke English, having been interpreters to the US Army during military campaigns in Iraq during 2007/2008. They told me some horrific stories about their families and friends who had been killed, women raped and sold into sexual slavery. On the 3^rd August, ISIS militia came to their village and took 80 men out into the street, and told them they must convert to Islam or they will be killed. Those who refused were shot; those who accepted were also shot. 

According to local news sources there are now over 30,000 Yezidi refugees in Turkey, having fled their villages on foot, it is estimated that there are over 1 million refugees in Turkey now since the start of ISIS attacks in Syria and Iraq.

A place in-between, a life in limbo

The disused sports hall housing the refugees is a place in-between, a place of not knowing, and hopes that may be shattered. There is not enough room inside the building or enough blankets for everyone to sleep. Many of the men are sleeping outside. The winter is coming and the people I spoke to have received no information about where they can go or when.

They have not been granted asylum in Turkey and neither do they want that. All of them have the same dream: to move to a place that is safe, in either Europe or America. They want permanent solutions and asylum, but for now they are in limbo, not having the tools or the means to be able to apply for it. Without having money to travel to an embassy, nor documents, they are reliant on officials to come to them. They are becoming increasing frustrated, and none of them know how long they will have to wait.

The majority of them are undocumented, having left their homes with just the clothes they were wearing, many of them had never had the need for a passport before. Turkey has granted them temporary shelter in its territory, but not political asylum.  

“We want to go to Europe or America”, says Saado, one of the former US interpreters, “we can’t go back to Iraq, it’s not safe, they will kill us, but we can’t stay in Turkey either. Maybe they will make us stay here for one or two years but then what?”

Another man, a Kurdish Yezidi who lives in Batman and has taken it on himself to organise the camp, tells me:  “The Turkish government say they are helping, but they are not doing anything to help us. The only help we are getting is from the local Kurdish community, they give us food and water and have helped with giving us blankets to sleep on, but we need help from governments. People see us but they are blind to us, we need help… Even the animals have rights, if they can’t give us human rights, at least give us animal rights.”

Credit: Kimbal Bumpstead

 "74th recorded genocide of Yezidian peope"

Turkey is a comfortable buffer zone for ‘Fortress Europe’, literally a space in-between, to help delay responses in helping to take in refugees. For how long these people will have to wait, for politicians to make decisions about their futures, they do not know.

The message from the refugees is clear, that they do not want to stay in Turkey, they are afraid of the possible future reprisals of Islamic fundamentalism and possible attacks here. I asked a boy what he thought about the future.  He said that he couldn’t event think about the future, everything was gone. He just wants to be able to go back to school and feel safe. I asked if he felt safe here. “No”, he said, “I am afraid that those people will come here too”.

Saado expands, saying that if Turkey really wanted to help then they would help by attacking ISIS, not by supplying them with weapons and supporting their actions.

Meanwhile, out on the streets of Batman, police in armoured tanks are firing tear gas at a group of protestors angry about the Turkish Government’s lack of support to Kurdish Guerillas who are fighting ISIS in the Syrian/Turkish border village of Kobane.

This is the 74^th recorded genocide of Yezidian people in history, as Saado tells me.  “This happens to our people every 100 years or so. The past 100 years alone has many cases of Yezidians being persecuted both in Iraq and Syria ,but also within Turkey. Turkey used to be home to a large proportion of the Yezidian population, but following the Ottoman led genocide during the years 1915-18, in which around 300,000 Yezidians were killed, plus further attacks after the creation of the Turkish state, most Yezidians fled to neighbouring countries. Stories are passed down through generations and their fears and lack of trust in the Turkish state is heavily apparent. Those I spoke to, made it clear that this is a religious problem, not a political one. ISIS wants to kill them because they believe they are devil worshipers, and the Turkish state does not officially recognise Yezidism as a religion. Interestingly, Turkey is classified by the United Nations as a ‘secular state’, however it only recognises three minority religions; Greek Orthodox Christians, Armenian Orthodox Christians, and Jews. Those Yezidians, and those of other minority religions such as Syrian Christian, Chaldean and Bulgarian Orthodox who live in Turkey are classified as either atheists or as Muslim.

“It’s chosen by god, (this genocide),” the other interpreter tells me. I ask why he thinks god would want that.  “I don’t know”, he says, “maybe this is not our place, maybe this is our destiny.” There is a sense of bad ‘kader’ (destiny)  amongst Yezidians, which I imagine many Kurdish people also can relate to. Having a shared history of being persecuted by the states that encompass them. These are placeless people, and now they do not even have a home.

Are you hopeful that something will change I ask? “Yes we hope,” he says, and looked down at the ground. “but until now we did not hear anything…. Maybe we are hopeless….” He smiles, and looks out into the yard.

In the yard, under a blanket propped by a stack of chairs, a group of children watch a TV. On the screen are images of American jets. They are excited, people welcome the latest bombings, but it’s not enough, “they are just putting on a show”, another man told me. “They are just securing their oil once again, rather than actually doing something to help the people”.

Credit: Kimbal Bumstead

"Shout Art Loud" - Using art to fight sexual violence against women in Egypt

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The vast majority of women in Egypt have experienced some form of sexual harassment: it is a common occurrence on the streets, on public transport and in private homes. But groups are starting to fight back – and artistic expression is a driving force in the campaigns for change.

Documentary filmmaker and women’s rights activist, Melody Patry is part of that movement. She has just produced "Shout Art Loud", an innovative “living report” on art and sexual violence in Egypt. The interactive documentary explores how Egyptians are using theatre, dance, music and graffiti to tackle the “epidemic” of sexual harassment and violence against women in their country. 

Published by Index on Censorship, an international organisation that promotes and defends freedom of expression, "Shout Art Loud" features interviews with artists, original artwork, videos and performances.

When Patry moved to Cairo in 2012 to learn Arabic and join a small women’s rights group, she was shocked to find out how much sexual violence against women had risen since the revolution. During the period February 2011 to January 2014, Egyptian women’s rights groups documented thousands of cases of sexual harassment, as well as crimes of sexual violence against at least 500 women, including gang rapes and mob-sexual assaults with sharp objects and fingers, .

“As the number of sexual crimes increased, I watched the amount of graffiti promoting women’s rights and denouncing violence against women grow and blossom on Cairo’s walls," she she writes in an introduction to her documentary.  One of them was “the circle of hell”, a mural painted by two Egyptian artists – Mira Shihadeh and el Zeft – near Tahrir Square. The image denounced the disturbing trend of attacks against female protesters in which women are encircled in mobs of 200 to 300 men who fight, pull, shove, beat and strip them.  “This painting, a few meters away for Tahrir Square, was a statement for all to see. Egypt would not stay silent before such crimes. Other murals and pro-women graffiti regularly appear on – and sometimes disappear from – Cairo’s walls,”  Patry writes. 

“When I was given the chance to take part in a theatre workshop exploring issues of sexual violence in Egypt, I jumped at the chance. Seeing the graffiti, and then taking part in a play, showed me first hand how powerful a role art can play in tackling the problem.

“This is why I decided to make “Shout Art Loud”. In the documentary, I try to highlight artists and civil society’s new approaches to denounce sexual harassment, encourage women to speak out and challenge social taboos. These include art exhibitions, graffiti and murals, street performances, dance, theatre, rap, comic strips, and digital tools to report and map harassment."

 “This innovative documentary is a reminder of the vital role artistic expression plays in tackling taboo subjects like sexual violence — in Egypt and beyond,” says Index CEO Jodie Ginsberg. “We want to bring this issue to a wider audience to show just how important artists and writers can be in bringing about change.”

Unearthed exhibition - Syrian Artist Responds to Conflict in his Homeland

Unearthed (in Memoriam), 2014, repurposed book covers/credit: Emma K Freeman

I love artist studios with their works in progress scattered all over, tools and material everywhere, the smell of paint and that special light, so I was delighted when Issam Kourbaj invited me to visit his studio in Cambrige.  Koubaj is a Syrian artist living in the UK, currently working on Unearthed, a exhibition inspited by the conflict in Syria.  I spent an afternoon in his attic studio and another at the P21 Gallery in London where Unearthed opens on July 4 and runs until August 16. I watched as he put the final touch to his pieces and listened to the processes and stories behind them. Each piece is his reflection on the conflict in Syria, but also carries fragments from his childhood in Swaida, a small village built from black volcanic stone in the mountains south of Damascus. 

Kourbaj is a wonderful storyteller, so I wish I could tell his stories here. Instead, I wrote this article about the exhibition. You can also read it on the Huffington Post's website.

Unearthed - Syrian artist responds to the was in his homeland

Over the last three years, Issam Kourbaj, a Syrian artist living in the UK, has been watching from a painful distance the war eviscerating his homeland: its people, its cities and villages, its past and present, and its memory. 

He brings the images of death, destruction and displacement reported by the media to his studio in Cambridge. There, in his attic rooms crammed with all matter of reclaimed objects, he tries to digest, respond and translate the war images into subtle forms "with meaning rather than anger. 

"My work is a quiet gesture, an archive to remember those who have been forgotten, and an invitation to ponder what the future might bring to what's left of my people and of my country," he says.

The result is Unearthed - a mesmerizing and haunting body of work in multimedia: his response to the Syrian conflict, as well as fragments from his childhood in a small village in the Druze mountains south of Damascus. The exhibition opens at the P21 Gallery in London on 4th July and runs until 16th August. 

Kourbaj was born in Syria and studied art, theatre design and architecture in Damascus, St. Petersburg and London. Since 1990, he has lived in Cambridge where he is artist-in-residence at Christ's College and teaches at the university. His work has been widely exhibited and is held in numerous private and public collections, including that of the British Museum.

For this exhibition, he has worked with a wide variety of media, from drawings on paper and photographic and optical work, to large-scale installations made for and assembled in the gallery itself. The exhibition is arranged as a journey, where pieces echo one another and create a multi-layered experience.

Damascus I, 2013, ink, collage and cut-out paper/credit: Emma K Freeman

For example, the exhibition opens with Damascus I, a piece based on an aerial map of the old city. Assembled from loose pages from reclaimed books, inked and sanded, it looks like an ancient wall or perhaps mummified skin. "It is the entire city - its many layers, its history." At end of the exhibition, we see Damascus II. It has a sculptural feel to it. It is the buckled, distorted version of Damascus I - a fragile, skeletal city - a city being destroyed by war.

Damascus II, 2013, ink, collage and cut-out paper/credit: Emma K Freeman

Most of Kourbaj's work is created from "excavated" objects - discarded poster fragments, X-rays plates obtained from a local hospital, sales records from a furniture shop, broken chairs and book covers found in a bookbinder' skip behind his studio. 

The 7-meter long Border, the other side of sky is the reverse side of a huge torn piece of billboard collected from a nearby skip. It looks like the rusty wing of an airplane. Scattered underneath, as if falling from the other side, are tiny pieces of colourful paper like little flecks of hope. "They represent all the people who are trying to cross the border, going to the other side of the sky. They don't know where they are going or whether they are going to make it."

Counting, Alphabetising, 2014, paper, fabric and leather fragments; insect pins/credit: Emma K Freeman

Counting and Alphabetising is a moving, 17-meter-long piece about loss. Small, colourful pieces torn from cardboard, fabric and leather book covers ("but they could be pieces of flesh or clothes") are pinned on the wall like butterflies in an immense entomological display. There are tiny ones arranged in neat rows and larger ones more randomly displayed. "They are a sort of archiving of what remains, of the fragility of life." 
 
Part of the same display, After Image was inspired by his mother. "I taught her to read and write. She was almost making drawings instead of writing. I wanted to connect with her and the struggle to make oneself heard or seen." In order to do this, Kourbaj formed his large letters upside down and with his left hand. 

Unhearted (in Memoriam), 2014, repurposed book covers/courtesy of P21

For Unearthed (in Memoriam), the artist covered 18 meters of wall with mounted discarded hardback book covers. Some are painted with bright colours and some are plain, but most have a black line painted across them, reminiscent of the traditional black ribbons used to indicate mourning in many countries. The sheer number of them - "all these lost, redundant books of which only the cover remains" - is a poignant reminder of the growing number of lost lives in Syria. 
 

171 weeks and ongoing..., 2011 onwards, ink on paper//credit: Emma K Freeman

One of the exhibition's last works, 171 weeks and ongoing..., is a diary of the war. Kourbaj started making abstract ink marks on cards (old record sales from a furniture store) during the first week of the conflict and keeps adding a new one every week. "They are inspired by the news, but I re-digest them. The images of the war from the media are too much to take. I needed to filter them."

The P21 Gallery is a London-based non-profit organisation promoting contemporary Middle Eastern and Arab art and culture. Proceeds from the exhibition will be donated to Médecins sans Frontières who are working in Syria.

Exhibition dates: 4th July - 16th August, 2014
Readings by Ruth Padel and Hisham Matar: 16th JulyArtist's talk with Venetia Porter: 23rd JulyCurators' talk with Bibiana Macedo and Louisa Macmillan: 30th July