Spiaggia Libera, Paris
Gaby Sahhar
Spiaggia Libera is pleased to present the new project Eurostine (Europe-Palestine) by Palestinian artist Gaby Sahhar specifically imagined for the 2023 Edition of Art-o-rama Art Fair in Marseille. The artist presents a series of new paintings and drawings around the notion of migration, immemorial remembrances and gender identity.
The body of works is a continuation into the artist’s work about Palestinian migration to Western Europe. They are interested in producing compositions based on their own family’s experiences of migrating to the United-Kingdom in the last two years, combining images from their trip in 2016 to the WestBank along with news footage, documentary and imagined photography.
The works fuse the geographical link between the West Bank and Western Europe, focusing on the architecture of European capitals like Brussels, London and Paris. Gaby Sahhar is interested in capturing the unique emotional framework that forms in many people from dysphoric backgrounds living in megacities.
Drawing on personal experiences as well as research, Gaby Sahhar examines how the brain forms narratives, emotions and memories of Palestine without ever living there. Eventually, how people connect back to their culture through the imagination and imagery they see in Western Europe.
The artist is more broadly interested in creating drawings that document world crises whilst simultaneously drawing scenes of human resilience within the context of the war. The works challenge our proximity that the war has in Europe and generate conversations around our shared vulnerabilities and social bonds we have as human beings. Presenting for the first time this series in Marseille is also a bridge between two geographies across the Mediterranean Sea.
