Against Disappearance Series: Hidden Presences

Hera Büyüktaşcıyan was born in Istanbul in 1984, graduated from Marmara University, Faculty of Fine Arts, in 2006 and lives and works in Istanbul. In her multidisciplinary practice, to anchor memory, she explores concepts of absence and invisibility, space and time, memory and forgotten aspects of history. Through her sculptures, drawings, film and site-specific interventions she dives into selected narratives from local myths, historic and iconographic elements that integrates with architecture and the memory of the terrestrial. Büyüktaşcıyan has participated in several local and international exhibitions, including the Lahore Biennial (2020), On Stones and Palimpsests, Green Art Gallery Dubai (2020), Face à la Mer, CAC Passerelle/ Brest (2020), Singapore Biennial (2019) and Toronto Biennial (2019), Gigantisme, FRAC,Dunkirk (2019), Neither on the Ground, Nor in the Sky, ifa-Galerie Berlin (2019), EVA International Ireland’s Biennale (2016), 14th Istanbul Biennial, (2015), 56th Venice Biennale National Pavilion of Armenia (2015), A Century of Centuries, SALT Beyoğlu, Turkey (2015), Fishbone, State of Concept, Athens, Greece (2015), The Jerusalem Show, Jerusalem (2014),  The Land Across the Blind, Galeri Mana, Istanbul, Turkey (2014), In Situ, PiST///, Istanbul, Turkey (2013) and Envy, Enmity, Embarrassment, ARTER, Istanbul, Turkey.

Jo Glanville is a journalist and editor. Her writing on culture and social affairs has been published in the Guardian, New York Times and London Review of Books, among other publications. She is former director of English PEN and was an award-winning editor of Index on Censorship. She edited Qissat (Telegram), an anthology of stories by Palestinian writers, and is editor of Looking for an Enemy: 8 essays on antisemitism, published by Short Books.

Adham Hafez is a Berlin and New York-based choreographer, sound artist, theorist, and performer. Recipient of multiple awards, including First Prize for Choreography by Cairo Opera House, Adham Hafez was recently described by the New Yorker as 'an intellectual magpie whose text-heavy works bristle with political ideas.’ He studied science, choreography, political science, and performance studies in Amsterdam, Paris, and New York. Adham Hafez is the founder of HaRaKa Platform and is the principal choreographer associated with its work.

HaRaKa Platformwas established in 2006 by a group of artists, theorists, and specialists initially based in Cairo and working from Berlin, New York City, and Cairo since 2011. HaRaKa is the first platform dedicated to performance studies and movement research in Egypt and the Arab region, and through local, regional, and international partnerships, it has curated, produced, published, researched, and set up pedagogic programs in the Arab world, Europe, and the US. Its latest projects were presented at Sharjah Architecture Triennial (UAE), La Mama Theatre (US), Hebbel Am Ufer (Germany), Impulstanz (Vienna), among others. The platform focuses on colonial histories in relation to body-based practices, gender in performance, the Anthropocene and its cultural implications, and new planetary paradigms. It is steered by its core members, Mona Gamil, Lamia Gouda, Adam Kucharski, and Adham Hafez. Over the past fifteen years, HaRaKa has created collaborations with renowned artists, including Cristina Caprioli (Stockholm), Constanza Macras (Berlin), Mey Seifan (Damascus/ Berlin), Yoshiko Chuma (New York), Myriam Van Imschoot (Brussels). HaRaKa stages performances, publishes and translates texts on choreography and theatre, and has curated several international festivals and exchange platforms in Egypt, the US, and Germany, specializing in contemporary Arab performance practices and diasporic communities.

Rashad Salim is an Iraqi-German artist and interdisciplinary researcher, with a particular interest in the history and development of culture and technology, as reflected in ancient boats, vernacular architecture and craft heritage. In 1977-78, as a young crew member on Thor Heyerdahl's Tigris expedition, he voyaged on a reed bundle boat from Iraq across the Indian Ocean. He has lived in countries including Morocco, Yemen, and the UK, where he has worked as a sculptor and printmaker and co-founded cultural associations including iNCiA (International Network for Contemporary Iraqi Artists). He has works in major collections including the British Museum and the Agha Khan collection. Since 2015, through the Ark Re-imagined project, he has worked to document, protect and revive the endangered craft heritage of Iraq, particularly its traditional boatbuilding techniques. He recently launched the Ark Re-imagined as Iraq's national participation in the Venice Architecture Biennale 2021.

Dr Noorah Al-Gailani is Council Member of The British Institute For The Study of Iraq (Gertrude Bell Memorial), and has been involved in supporting the Basra Museum project. Dr Noorah has been Curator of Islamic Civilisations at Glasgow Museums since 2003. She interprets Islamic art and culture, both ancient and modern, through research, exhibitions and a variety of educational activities and public events. Noorah gained her BA in Interior Design from the College of Fine Arts, Baghdad University, 1989, her MA in Museum Studies at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London in 1994 and her PhD in Theology from the University of Glasgow in 2016. Her work experience in Iraq included furniture design and folk-art preservation. Between 1994 and 1996 she was Project Officer at the Grange Museum of Community History, London Borough of Brent, and Assistant Curator at the Ancient Monuments Laboratory, English Heritage. Between 1996 and 2003 she was the Curator of John Wesley’s House and the Museum of Methodism, London. Noorah's PhD thesis The Shrine of ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī in Baghdad & the Shrine of ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Jīlānī in ʿAqra: Mapping the multiple orientations of two Qādirī Sufi shrines in Iraq investigates the material culture of Sufism in Islam. Her publications include co-authoring The Islamic Year, surahs, stories and celebrations Hawthorn Press, Stroud, 2002, written for non-Muslim children wishing to explore Islam informally.

Tamara Alattiya is a university instructor, holding a Master’s degree in postcolonial translation studies. Tamara is also working in managing and coordinating cultural heritage projects in Iraq, the most recent project is Safina (Ark re-imagined) that aims to revive Iraq’s maritime heritage and history. Tamara is a volunteer at Basra Museum since 2016, and has worked with 'Friends of Basra Museum Organization' that assisted with the establishment of the new Museum. She is also one of the managing team of a new museum at Basra of 'Iraq’s Modern History'. Tamara won a graduate scholarship and studied at ARCA (Association for Research into Crimes against Art), and was the Iraqi participant at the British Museum ITP 2019. Tamara is a freelance translator, with special focus on the translation of documents, books, and resources that are related to Iraq’s and Basra history.