• About
  • The artist
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    • Jumana Emil Abboud

    Jumana Emil Abboud in collaboration with Issa Freij, Looking for water (location scouting for Maskouneh). Photo : © Issa Freij

    Born in Shefa-’Amr in 1971, Jumana Emil Abboud lives and works between Jerusalem and London, where she is a PhD stu­dent at the Slade School of Art/UCL.

    In her work, she mixes draw­ings, videos, per­for­mances, texts, col­lec­tions of objects and sto­ries, to explore the unspeak­able links that are cre­ated between people and their envi­ron­ment. She is inter­ested in our memory, as it can be recorded by bodies, places and nat­ural ele­ments, through sto­ries, myths or rituals. The artist also studies nar­ra­tive prac­tices, its oral forms, as well as the way in which these nar­ra­tives and tales relate to a par­tic­ular land­scape and nat­ural sites. How is his­tory - per­sonal or col­lec­tive - both moti­vated and recorded by our envi­ron­ment? How is it told and how does this affects our per­cep­tion of this envi­ron­ment, whether nat­ural or cul­tural? How do we shape our living envi­ron­ment through these nar­ra­tives, and how do they shape us in return? How and why are we ‘attached’ to places: how are we ‘con­nected’ to the place in which we live? These are all ques­tions that Jumana Emil Abboud’s work asks.

    Jumana Emil Abboud has par­tic­i­pated in numerous inter­na­tional exhi­bi­tions and events over the past ten years. Since 2008, her work has been included in: L’Art au féminin, MAMA (Musée national d’art mod­erne et con­tem­po­rain), Algiers, 2008; Intimate Narratives - Masarat Palestine, Les Halles des Schaerbek, Brussels, 2008; Scènes du Sud II - Méditerranée Orientale, Carré d’Art-Musée d’art con­tem­po­rain de Nîmes, Nîmes, 2008; Sentences on the Banks, Darat al Funun, Amman, 2010; Acción! MAD-International Festival of Performance Art, Madrid, 2010; Paper Feather Sugar Water, Foundation 3,14, Berge, 2011; Second World, Steirischer Herbst Festival, Graz, 2011; Points of Departure, Al-Mahatta Gallery, Ramallah, and ICA, London, 2013; Cinematic Prism, Arts Initiative Tokyo, Tokyo, 2017; On Women and Revolution, Gallery One, Ramallah, 2017; When ani­mals talked to humans, Gallery Travesia Cuatro, Madrid, 2018.

    Her work has been fea­tured in sev­eral solo exhi­bi­tions: Haunted Springs and Water Demons in Palestine, Kunstraum, London & BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, 2016; O whale don’t swallow our moon! Khalil Sakakini cul­tural center, Ramallah, 2016; The Horse, the bird, the Tree and Stone, Bildmuseet, Umeå University, Umeå, 2017; The pomegranate and the sleeping ghoul, Darat Al Funun - Khalid Shoman Foundation, Amman, 2017.

    She has par­tic­i­pated in the 53rd & 56th Biennale di Venezia, 2009
    and 2015; Qalandiya International, Palestine, 2012 and 2016; Sharjah Biennial 13: Tamawuj in Ramallah Shifting Ground, 2017; Living Together per­for­mance fes­tival, MOAD DADE College, Miami; BMW TATE LIVE Exhibition, Tate Modern, London, 2018; and Unweaving Narratives, The Palestinian Museum, Birzeit, 2018.

    In 2020, she is wel­comed in res­i­dence at the Villa Vassilieff (in January and February). Visit the ded­i­cated page on our web­site.