Naji Abu Nowar's "Bedouin spaghetti western" Theeb (2014) is in the news again, only now it is the "BAFTA-winning, and Oscar nominated, Theeb." Theeb is "one of only 10 films from the MENA region to have been nominated for an Oscar for best foreign film since 1947, and of the 112 films submitted for the … Continue reading Naji Abu Nowar’s Theeb After the BAFTA
Tag: Jordan
Inhebbek Hedi, directed by Tunisian director Mohamed Ben Attia, with Belgium's Dardenne brothers as co-producers, is "the first Arab contender in two decades" in the official competition of the Berlinale, running from 11-21 February. Hedi tells the story of "a simple young man" who "does not expect much from the life that is traced for … Continue reading Mohamed Ben Attia’s Hedi and the Berlinale
Hisham Bustani’s The Perception of Meaning is an eclectic collection of texts, ranging from one sentence flash fiction to poetic passages to retellings of fairytales and longer works, including "History will not be made on this couch". Throughout, the original Arabic is mirrored on the opposing page by the translation into English by Thoraya El-Rayyes. As … Continue reading Hisham Bustani’s The Perception of Meaning
Snow in Amman: An Anthology of Short Stories is a collection of eleven contemporary short stories from Jordan translated and edited by Ibtihal Mahmoud and Alexander Hadded, with a foreword by Samir Al Sharif which provides a very brief overview of the Jordanian short story for the reader unfamiliar with the literature. As this anthology is … Continue reading Review of Snow in Amman: An Anthology of Short Stories
The Australian Arab Film Festival kicked off a few days ago and goes on to the 30th of August. The festival runs in Sydney until 16th August, Melbourne from 21st -23rd August and Canberra from 28th -30th August. The full program is here. Among the films on show are: In a small Lebanese coastal village … Continue reading Arab Film Festival Australia
The exhibit “She Who Tells A Story” is a photography exhibit, a smaller scale Light from the Middle East which is dedicated to the work of women artists, featuring work by twelve women photographers from Iran and the Arab world. The photographers are: Iraqi Jananne Al-Ani, Yemeni Boushra Almutawakel, Iranians Gohar Dashti, Shadi Ghadirian, Newsha Tavakolian and Shirin Neshat, Egyptians Nermine … Continue reading She Who Tells A Story
Malmo Arab Film Festival is coming to Uppsala on May 6th and 7th before the final stop at Stockholm on the 8th and 9th. The films to be shown are: Letters from Al Yarmouk Villa 69 Excuse my French The story of this film, about a boy who transfers from private to public school in … Continue reading Scandinavia’s Arab Film Festival
In its second Film Week, The Arab Fund for Arts and Culture (AFAC) is bringing works by filmmakers from seven Arab countries (Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Palestine, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia) to Cairo. The week-long programme will run between 15 and 22 April at Zawya cinema. The films to be shown include: Return to Homs by Talal Derky … Continue reading The Second AFAC Film Week
Saibal Chatterjee at The Gulf Today writes about the four Arab films screened at the 39th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), Palestinian Suha Arraf’s Villa Touma on four Christian women in Ramallah, Jordanian Naji Abu Nowar’s "Bedouin Western" Theeb (Wolf), Lebanese Ghassan Salhab’s drama of amnesia and hostage-taking, The Valley, and Iraqi-Moroccan Tala Hadid’s "psychologically … Continue reading Four Arab Films at TIFF
The 2014 Arab Film Festival is being held from the 20th to the 26th in Cinematheque Busan as part of the Arab Cultural Festival, running from May to July, including an art exhibition, a photography exhibition and a public lecture series. This is the second consecutive year for the festival, which is hosted by Korea-Arab … Continue reading 2014 Arab Film Festival in Korea
As a practicisng architect, multidisciplinary artist Dina Haddadin's work often focuses on the visual tension between the clean architectural lines of construction and the disordered, unorganized aspects of empty spaces and the ephemereality of place. Her bio from her site describes her work as dealing with "the struggle over the right to the city and … Continue reading Space and Power: Dina Haddadin
The two works of art above, by Lebanese artist Youssef Shawki, are described in an article in The National as at the centre of his exhibition, Acid Fields, "a collection of abstract works featuring tormented and distorted figures." The only two paintings that veer from illustrating bodies are the maps: Arab World Map Construct / … Continue reading When Absurdity Becomes The Form
Arab Hyphen 