Full Description
In this groundbreaking book, a range of internationally renowned and emerging academics, writers, artists, curators, activists and filmmakers critically reflect on the ways in which visual culture has appropriated and developed new media across North Africa and the Middle East. Examining the opportunities presented by the real-time generation of new, relatively unregulated content online, Uncommon Grounds evaluates the prominent role that new media has come to play in artistic practices - and social movements - in the Arab world today. Analysing alternative forms of creating, broadcasting, publishing, distributing and consuming digital images, this book also enquires into a broader global concern: does new media offer a 'democratisation' of - and a productive engagement with - visual culture, or merely capitalise upon the effect of immediacy at the expense of depth?Featuring full-colour artists' inserts, this is the first book to extensively explore the degree to which the grassroots popularity of Twitter and Facebook has been co-opted into mainstream media, institutional and curatorial characterisations of 'revolution' - and whether artists should be wary of perpetuating the rhetoric and spectacle surrounding political events.In the process, Uncommon Grounds reveals how contemporary art practices actively negotiate present-day notions of community-based activism, artistic agency and political engagement.
Contents
Anthony DowneyIntroductionPhilip Rizk 2011 is not 1968: An open letter to an onlookerFranco BerardiThe Paradox of Media Activism: The Net is not a Tool, It's an EnvironmentAnthony DowneyFor the Common Good: Artistic Practices and Civil Society in Tunisia. Jens Maier-Rothe, Dina Kafafi, Azin FeizabadiCitizens Reporting and the Fabrication of Collective Memory Derya YucelArt's Networks: A New Communal ModelDina MatarA critical reflection on aesthetics and politics in the digital ageNat Muller Performing the Undead: Life and Death in Social Media and Contemporary ArtSheyma BualiDigital, Aesthetic, Ephemeral: A brief look at image and narrativeOmar Kholeif Re-Examining The Social Impulse: Politics, Media and Art after the Arab Uprisings Maymanah Farhat New Media and the Spectacle of the War on TerrorLaura U. MarksArab Glitch Maxa Zoller Potential Media The appropriation of images commercial media and activist practices in Egypt today Nermin Sayba??l? The Magnetic Remenances: Voice and Sound in Digital Art and MediaEdit Molnar and Aleya HamzaWhen the Going Gets Tough...Tarek KhouryThe Art of the Written Word + New Media Dissemination: Across the Borders between Syria and LebanonMahmoud Abu HashhashFarther Than Language Can ReachWalter MignoloRe:emerging, Decentring, Delinking: Shifting the Geographies of Sensing, Believing and KnowingAmal KhalafThe Many Afterlives of LuluTimo Kaabi-LinkeOn Revolution and Rubbish: What has Changed in Tunisia since Spring 2011Annabelle SrebernyCardboard Khomeini - An InterrogationGulf LaborSaadiyat and the Gulf Labor BoycottARTIST PROJECTSTarzan and Arab: GAZAWOODGanzeer: POSTER DESIGNS Sophia Al-Maria: CHEWING THE DATA FATSarah Abu Abdallah: SAUDI AUTOMOBILEFaycal Bahgriche: FAMILY FRIENDLYJananne Al-Ani: SHADOW SITES Mosireen: REVOLUTION TRIPTYCH Mariam Ghani: Notes from the Archive (IMAGES)
