The Ruins We Carry is the first solo US museum exhibition by Abounaddara, an anonymous collective of artists based in Damascus, Syria. Best known for their unsettling portraits of everyday life during the Syrian Revolution and subsequent civil war, the members of the collective created and posted a short film to Vimeo every Friday between 2011 and 2017, as well as two acclaimed feature-length films. Their works capture intimate moments of questioning and transformation, opening a space of radical imagination and making perceptible a dimension of the invisible in the midst of upheaval and destruction. The Imagemaker (2024), a new three-channel film installation premiering in this exhibition, explores the world-making powers of a craftsman known as Abou Diab, the last practitioner of the art of stamped cloth in Damascus and a central figure in the history of the collective. Like a photographer in a darkroom, he labors in a dimly lit workshop, printing on fabrics using improvised, alchemical inks made from rotting, rusted matter. As Abou Diab transforms his cloth, Abounaddara considers the potential of the creative act to refashion ruins into life. Layering filmic fragments across time and space, The Ruins We Carry presents this new work in dialogue with a selection of Abounaddara's short films, screened every weekend during the exhibition's run in Theater 2 on the lower level.
Abounaddara: The Ruins We Carry is curated by Anneka Lenssen, Associate Professor in the Department of the History of Art, UC Berkeley, and Stefania Pandolfo, Professor in the Department of Anthropology, UC Berkeley, with Margot Norton, BAMPFA Chief Curator, and Matthew Villar Miranda, BAMPFA Curatorial Associate.
The exhibition is part of BAMPFA's Campus Collaborations, an ongoing series in partnership with faculty and students at UC Berkeley. This series brings exhibitions at BAMPFA into critical dialogue with the vibrant academic life at UC Berkeley.
This exhibition is made possible in part by a Mellon Project Grant provided by the Division of the Arts & Humanities Dean's office.
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Abounaddara: The Ruins We Carry is curated by Anneka Lenssen, Associate Professor in the Department of the History of Art, UC Berkeley, and Stefania Pandolfo, Professor in the Department of Anthropology, UC Berkeley, with Margot Norton, BAMPFA Chief Curator, and Matthew Villar Miranda, BAMPFA Curatorial Associate.
The exhibition is part of BAMPFA's Campus Collaborations, an ongoing series in partnership with faculty and students at UC Berkeley. This series brings exhibitions at BAMPFA into critical dialogue with the vibrant academic life at UC Berkeley.
This exhibition is made possible in part by a Mellon Project Grant provided by the Division of the Arts & Humanities Dean's office.
The Ruins We Carry is the first solo US museum exhibition by Abounaddara, an anonymous collective of artists based in Damascus, Syria. Best known for their unsettling portraits of everyday life during the Syrian Revolution and subsequent civil war, the members of the collective created and posted a short film to Vimeo every Friday between 2011 and 2017, as well as two acclaimed feature-length films. Their works capture intimate moments of questioning and transformation, opening a space of radical imagination and making perceptible a dimension of the invisible in the midst of upheaval and destruction. The Imagemaker (2024), a new three-channel film installation premiering in this exhibition, explores the world-making powers of a craftsman known as Abou Diab, the last practitioner of the art of stamped cloth in Damascus and a central figure in the history of the collective. Like a photographer in a darkroom, he labors in a dimly lit workshop, printing on fabrics using improvised, alchemical inks made from rotting, rusted matter. As Abou Diab transforms his cloth, Abounaddara considers the potential of the creative act to refashion ruins into life. Layering filmic fragments across time and space, The Ruins We Carry presents this new work in dialogue with a selection of Abounaddara's short films, screened every weekend during the exhibition's run in Theater 2 on the lower level.
Abounaddara: The Ruins We Carry is curated by Anneka Lenssen, Associate Professor in the Department of the History of Art, UC Berkeley, and Stefania Pandolfo, Professor in the Department of Anthropology, UC Berkeley, with Margot Norton, BAMPFA Chief Curator, and Matthew Villar Miranda, BAMPFA Curatorial Associate.
The exhibition is part of BAMPFA's Campus Collaborations, an ongoing series in partnership with faculty and students at UC Berkeley. This series brings exhibitions at BAMPFA into critical dialogue with the vibrant academic life at UC Berkeley.
This exhibition is made possible in part by a Mellon Project Grant provided by the Division of the Arts & Humanities Dean's office.
read more
Abounaddara: The Ruins We Carry is curated by Anneka Lenssen, Associate Professor in the Department of the History of Art, UC Berkeley, and Stefania Pandolfo, Professor in the Department of Anthropology, UC Berkeley, with Margot Norton, BAMPFA Chief Curator, and Matthew Villar Miranda, BAMPFA Curatorial Associate.
The exhibition is part of BAMPFA's Campus Collaborations, an ongoing series in partnership with faculty and students at UC Berkeley. This series brings exhibitions at BAMPFA into critical dialogue with the vibrant academic life at UC Berkeley.
This exhibition is made possible in part by a Mellon Project Grant provided by the Division of the Arts & Humanities Dean's office.
show less
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