The Gaze | Curator Munira Al Sayegh on Gauze by Hazem Harb

  • Curator Munira Al Sayegh on Gauze by Hazem Harb
    Curator Munira Al Sayegh on Gauze by Hazem Harb

    Gauze, a fine interwoven mesh of yarn, originating from Gaza, is a material rooted in medicine and utilized for bodily impairment as an initial attempt for repair. Hazem Harb’s solo exhibition, Gauze, mimics the character of this material, in its conceptual form of embrace, restoration, and interwovenness. Gauze further anchors Harb’s work through its geographical origins, and its associations with the body, urging for connectivity and restoration.

     
  • In this body of work the question of body and place unfolds as an anchor subject. Through this framework an...

    In this body of work the question of body and place unfolds as an anchor subject. Through this framework an attempted visual translation and negotiation mines Harb’s context and lived realities in order to establish a variant definition that departs from fragmentation. These translated negotiations of time, place and the body, propose a visual language specific to Harb, homogenizing the body, with the land and its architecture, throughout time. Furthermore, the work suggests no formal beginning or end, drawing only on elements of newness or recontextualization; to oppose erasure, Harb proposes transformation.

    In mimicking the geography of Gaza, honing in on the Mediterranean Sea, and its inevitability to change, Harb observes his reality and reannunciates it through repetition and what comes from its accumulation. The accumulation crystallizes as a translation of physical structures found in the day to day, chairs, buildings, and plants, which accentuate the importance of private and intimate spaces in reference to place and person as witnessed in his earlier works. The physical body, a vessel of aggregations, also takes center stage throughout the series entitled Dystopia, 2024 explored within the set of drawings produced by Harb in reaction to the current realities of Gaza.

     
  • Harb’s return to charcoal after more than two decades emphasizes, the material itself, one that becomes of life, when its...
    Hazem Harb
    Dystopia is not a Noun #11, 2023
    Charcoal on Canvas Fine Art Paper
    200 x 120 cm

    Harb’s return to charcoal after more than two decades emphasizes, the material itself, one that becomes of life, when its original form of wood becomes deprived from oxygen, a satirical parallel, actively trying to turn the natural cycle of life to death on its head. The series is set in a manner so that the characters stand proud, engaged in conversation. This tight space invites the viewer to be an observer and a listener into this conversation. The materials used throughout the exhibition further set the serious tone of repair, and repetition.

     
  • Gauze is a material used in a painterly form to suggest the transcendental movement of bodies in space. Poetic and...

    Gauze is a material used in a painterly form to suggest the transcendental movement of bodies in space. Poetic and almost haunting in its sparseness and minimalism, Harb captures a departure that is set in fluctuation and perseverance. From the depiction of morphing bodies in his earlier work to the layering of archives in the collages that characterize his current practice, and the dystopian characters growing out of the earth depicted, Harb establishes powerful tension between body and place. Charcoal to gauze. The delicate and deliberate essence of the materials deployed by Harb is one that intertwines on itself, diverting tangents from different moments in his oeuvre into the same stream. Gauze, is a call for embrace, restoration, and interwovenness at this time, marking Harb’s initial attempt for repair.

    Text by Munira Al Sayegh, independent curator, and founder of Dirwaza Curatorial Lab, an Abu Dhabi-based creative incubator and projects partner.