Written To Not Remain
Bint El Barzakh
Bint el Barzakh: (Daughter of the Isthmus) is an installation consisting of a sculptural object, and a video work introducing a fictional character, narrating histories and speculations that are situated between two waters without merging or transgression. Set in Ras El Bar north of Egypt, where the Nile meets the Mediterranean. The site of liminality becomes a landscape of contemplation on myths, memories, migration, and absence.
The work weaves together research, poetry, and science fiction about the ecological phenomenon of The Barzakh in nature, and navigates its roots in Islamic philosophy, drawing upon the legacy of the early Muslim scholar and poet Ibn Arabi.
The sculptural object in the work is a result of experimentation with crystallography processes. The topology of Bismuth– a crystalline metal known to be a facet for electrical insulations, forms a hinge state when established on the edges of the crystal, where two vertical and horizontal faces meet in a square spiral symmetry pattern, without the crystal-metal losing its density or possibility of electrical conductions. Offering a parallel material exploration speculating around possibilities of transgression and collision within the conceptual framework of the Barzakh.
2024
Supported by V2 lab for the unstable media
Developed within summer sessions residency at Cairo-tronica
The work weaves together research, poetry, and science fiction about the ecological phenomenon of The Barzakh in nature, and navigates its roots in Islamic philosophy, drawing upon the legacy of the early Muslim scholar and poet Ibn Arabi.
The sculptural object in the work is a result of experimentation with crystallography processes. The topology of Bismuth– a crystalline metal known to be a facet for electrical insulations, forms a hinge state when established on the edges of the crystal, where two vertical and horizontal faces meet in a square spiral symmetry pattern, without the crystal-metal losing its density or possibility of electrical conductions. Offering a parallel material exploration speculating around possibilities of transgression and collision within the conceptual framework of the Barzakh.
2024
Supported by V2 lab for the unstable media
Developed within summer sessions residency at Cairo-tronica
