• About
  • The artist
  • Images

    • Nuit Blanche 2020 - Maskouneh, Jumana Emil Abboud in collaboration with Issa Freij

    Video instal­la­tion as part
    of Nuit Blanche 2020
    Saturday October 3rd, from 8pm to 2am

    Warning : Mandatory booking at this address

    Jumana Emil Abboud in collaboration with Issa Freij, Maskouneh (Inhabited), 2018, Captures.

    As part of the Nuit Blanche on Saturday 3 October 2020, Villa Vassilieff pre­sents the video instal­la­tion Maskouneh (Inhabited) by Palestinian artist Jumana Emil Abboud, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Issa Freij. Already pre­sented at the Tate Modern (London, UK) in 2018, at Darat al Funun (Amman, Jordan) and at Bildmuseet (Umeå, Sweden) in 2017, this video instal­la­tion will be com­pletely rethought and readapted for the Nuit Blanche in order to be pro­jected on two screens out­side the Villa Vassilieff, in the Chemin du Montparnasse.

    The 2020 edi­tion of the Nuit Blanche pro­poses that we ques­tion our anthro­pocen­tric view­point and turn it towards all living beings. Curated by four museum con­ser­va­tors (Amélie Simier, Musée Bourdelle; Jeanne Brun, Musée Zadkine; Christophe Leribault, Petit Palais and Fabrice Hergott, Musée d’Art Moderne), this edi­tion, rethought according to social dis­tancing mea­sures, will offer a rich itinerary, par­tic­u­larly on the Right and the Left Bank of Paris.

    Download our Press release
    See the Nuit Blanche Press release and the full pro­gram

    Maskouneh

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

    Maskouneh (Inhabited) is a visual trans­la­tion of the research and col­lec­tions con­ducted by Jumana Emil Abboud over almost ten years on Palestinian oral his­to­ries and their rela­tion­ship to the earth and land­scapes. This video instal­la­tion focuses on land­scapes almost devoid of human pres­ence. Bird songs res­onate through the forests, a horse wan­ders through a rocky field, a series of hills partly obstruct a remote town. Pink trees in flow­ering bloom. A goat bleats. Rain falls, streams rumble, water flows into the caves. Here and there, a human figure sits, small in the dis­tance.

    This work explores themes of memory, loss and resilience through our rela­tion­ship to land­scape. Together with pho­tog­ra­pher col­lab­o­rator Issa Freij, the artist has trav­elled to film the sites of the sto­ries, called «haunted sites», once thought to be inhab­ited by spirits, both good and bad. These are often places that have a deep con­nec­tion to water sources known for their restora­tive power.

    This instal­la­tion is an attempt to make vis­ible and archive places that are not shown on any map and are con­fronted with both the powers of nature and the powers of pol­i­tics. In the artist’s own words, the «almost aggres­sive alter­ation of the land­scape today - new cities, infras­truc­ture and illegal set­tle­ments - has resulted in many Palestinian sites dis­ap­pearing, buried or con­fis­cated; many water sources and the sto­ries and mem­o­ries attached to them are now sep­a­rated from our roots, as part of a slow pro­cess of era­sure. »