…A Faraway Souvenir
- About…A Faraway Souvenir, 2001-2007
Lambda photo print (6 meters)
In collaboration with Ahmad Gharbieh In 2001, Hadjithomas and Joreige worked on a project by Ahmad Gharbieh who photographed the 34 electrical poles on Ouzai Avenue, situated in a predominantly Shia popular area in the suburbs of Beirut, working their way from the north end of the avenue to the south. Each pole carries frames, each frame contains a photo of a young man, a “martyr.” Some frames are empty, as if expecting future martyrs– a topic which the artists have reflected on in-depth in their text “A State of Latency”. In their deaths, these martyrs are promised eternal life through their memorialised images. Are these images able to withstand the wear of natural elements and time for eternity? - Other installations
In 2007, the electrical poles of Ouzai Avenue were repainted, and the avenue repaved. Due to the passage of time, the photos of the martyrs, which remained mounted after all those years, faded in their frames. The faces of the young men were no longer recognizable; often all that is left is a ghostly outline. To document this change, the artists re-photographed them and placed them next to the images taken in 2001. Exhibited as a six meter-long photo print, which visitors are able to walk along, the work raises questions around the memory of history, of heroes of old wars in the face of heroes of new ones, and what the future holds for these images.
