Symposium
Contemporary Arab Art

With Catherine David. And Faouzi Bensaidi, Abdellah Taïa, Nadia Tazi

Siwa and the Manifeste des Libertés (Manifesto of Liberties) propose to jointly organise an event to reflect on contemporary art in the Arab and Muslim world. The purpose of this event, chaired by the curator and art critic Catherine David, will be to present a series of works (photos, videos, documentaries, etc.) that are significant in that they embody real "experiences of freedom". With the focus usually on verbal discourse, there is little awareness of the image and its political implications in countries where nothing, whether politics itself or artistic production, or even a combination of both, is to be taken for granted. This event is therefore an opportunity to show the vitality of these methods, their increasing participation in the international art scene, and thus to present another facet of modernity. The symposium, which should generate exchanges with artists, philosophers and writers, but also with the directors of associations, will provide a fresh approach to sensitive issues relating to Islam, authority, violence and cultural policy.

Siwa and the Manifeste des Libertés (a group of Arab democrats promoting reflection on contemporary political and cultural issues) have asked Catherine David to establish a selection of works and to lead the debate on the issues they raise, and more generally on the incorporation of these cultural practices in these societies as in the art world in general. This interplay and crossing of viewpoints, opening up the issues in a new way, should appeal to a diverse audience.

Think workshop
Political violence in the Arab world

With Jean-Pierre Han, Marie-José Mondzain, Arafat Sadallah, Philippe Malone, Shadi al Zaqzouq, works of Sharif Waked.

The scandal of the suicide attack is twofold: in addition to its hyperbolic violence, unquestioning of itself, it is treated as banal or almost so in the flow of daily information. Philosophers and artists will attempt to initiate a reflection on this act of pure annihilation and terror, in which, by turning himself into a war machine, the soldier gives death an unqualified reversibility.
Artistic presentations on the theme will accompany the debate.