Our Songs Were Ready for All the Wars to Come by Noor Abed & Dirar Kalash
Join us for a performative screening of Our Songs Were Ready for All the Wars to Come, 2021 , super 8mm film with live sound performance by Dirar Kalash.
Choreographed scenes based on historicised folktales from Palestine. The work aims to create a new aesthetic form to re-awaken latent stories from the folklore, ones that are mainly based around water wells and their connection to communal rituals around notions of disappearance, mourning and death.
The work explores the critical stance of ‘folklore’ as a source of knowledge, and its possible connection to alternative social and representational models in Palestine. Viewing folklore as born from land and specific sites, how can it become a common emancipatory tool for people to overturn the characteristics of the dominant discourses, reclaim their history and land, and rewrite reality as they know it?
While Dirar Kalash will compose and perform live music alongside the film, the only narration in the film is a song, which is sung by Palestinian singer Maya Khaldi. Its lyrics are a collage of different folk tales. Captured through mediums of film and sound, situated stories are archived and represented, creating a context that explores the capacity of social formation, and the possibility of recalling a memory that is capable of decentralising images of fixity; a memory that is liberated from monuments.
About the event
Free. Limited Capacity.
Booking is required.
The duration of the event is 90 minutes. A rest break is not included. Seating is available.
Access
Find information about getting here and our building access and facilities here.
Speakers will use microphones.
This event is wheelchair accessible.
There are no audio descriptions for this event.
If you have any questions around access or have specific access requirements we can accommodate, please get in touch with us by emailing info@nottinghamcontemporary.org or phoning 0115 948 9750.
Safety during your visit
Please do not attend this event if you/someone in your household is currently COVID-19 positive, has suspected symptoms or is awaiting test results.
Staff and visitors are welcome to wear a face mask in all areas.
Dirar Kalash (b. 1982) is a musician and sound artist whose work spans a wide range of musical and sonic practices within a variety of instrumental, compositional and improvisational contexts. Kalash also extends his practice into inter-disciplinary theoretical research. He has produced several solo and collaborative musical albums and is active as touring musician, in addition to that he also created several sound installations, live audio-visual performances, and photography projects.
Noor Abed (b. 1988) works at the intersection of performance, media and film. Through a process of image making, her works create situations where social possibilities are both rehearsed and performed. Abed’s work has been screened and exhibited internationally at Anthology Film Archives, New York, Gabes Cinema Fen Film Festival, Tunisia, Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival, The New Wight Biennial, Los Angeles, Leonard & Bina Gallery, Montréal, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, Ujazdowski Centre for Contemporary Art, Warsaw, The Mosaic Rooms, London, and MAXXI - National Museum of 21st Century Art, Rome. Abed is currently a resident at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam 2022-24 and was recently awarded the Han Nefkens Foundation/Fundació Antoni Tàpies Video Art Production Grant 2022.
Event:
Our Songs Were Ready for All the Wars to Come by Noor Abed & Dirar KalashDates:
21 Jun 2023, 6.30pmCurated by:
Canan Batur, assisted by Philippa Douglas
Supported by:
