• Letter from Paris – By Nina Zivancevic

    Date posted: June 25, 2006 Author: jolanta
    If you remember the Rivington School’s artists of the 1980s and 1990s, you are likely to find a similar sensibility in the socio-political work at the CARGO 21 space in Paris.

    Letter from Paris

    By Nina Zivancevic

    Courtesy of Des Enfants de Paris et de Palestine - Israel

    Courtesy of Des Enfants de Paris et de Palestine – Israel

    If you remember the Rivington School’s artists of the 1980s and 1990s, you are likely to find a similar sensibility in the socio-political work at the CARGO 21 space in Paris. Snuggled comfortably in the 18th arrondissement, one of the most multicultural areas of Paris, this gallery recently housed a show of Palestinian and Israeli artists, poets, musicians and filmmakers entitled "Born naked". The cultural association "M�moire de l’avenir" (Memory of the future) presented films and video works by Norma Marcos, Palestinian Yassmine Al Masri and an Israeli, Sigalit Liphschitz. Pierre Merejkowsky’s militant and experimental films were on view, as was Mahdi Fleifel’s project, focusing on Palestinian refugee camps. Though all these artists were ‘born naked’ into their respective multicultural and sensitive backgrounds, they have all worked in promoting a culture of Peace, a culture of human awareness and brotherhood.

    The list of Palestinian visual artists included Hannan Abu Houssein, a sculptor and an installation artist who explores the role of a woman in an Arab society; Amal Abdenour and Nadine Naous, who create memories of their family and their quotidian world to get us closer to them. Hally Pancer photographed the lives of women of Tel Aviv, and Margalit Berriet, a Tel Aviv painter living in Paris, guided us through "the labyrinth of memory" in her work.

    The curators of this show, Carol Shyman and Bernard Pierron successfully unveil the lighter side of an otherwise dark vision of this world and its greedy and hurtful affairs. In their press release, they quoted writer Albert Cohen: "In the streets I am sad like a petroleum lamp that keeps on burning." Yet, in the gallery’s glowing environment filled with the music of traditional Middle-eastern instruments, poets such as Steve Dalachinsky (an Israeli living in NY), Mohamad Hadai (of Lebanon), Michael Adams (of Israel) and Hamid Tibouchi (from Algeria) read their work. Their voices, combined with the visions of the work on the walls, create an illusory oasis of peace, and a vision of hope for the world at large.

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