Salons - Collections of Memory and Loss
Nine art installations examining identity-shaping objects in the salons of Palestinian homes. 28 May - 31 Aug. 2022, A.M. Qattan Foundation, Ramallah.
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What Remains?
Installation
I am looking at the overlapping of time, material, and labour in relation to the Palestinian hujrah rug. Hujrah is a hand-woven textile made by Palestinian villagers and Bedouin women and usually displayed in salons. Weaving one hujrah of 1.8 metres x 3.0 metres usually requires about twenty kilos of spun wool and takes an entire year to make. (Each sheep produces about one kilo of raw wool in a year – yielding 400-500 grams of cleaned spun yarn).
By ‘unweaving’ the rug, I seek to disturb our belief in the immortality of possessions. I urge the observer to look afresh at the spun threads and weaving process. I subvert our attachment to this iconic symbol through the act of unweaving, a process that pulls apart the labour of women, space, time, possessions, and symbolism.
Lara Salous is a Palestinian multimedia artist and design-based researcher living in Ramallah, Palestine. She employs painting, graphics, video and installation in her artwork. She is interested in the intersection between Palestinian interiors, local materials and industry.
For the past two years, Salous considered wool as a neglected raw material, essential in Palestinian local heritage. She shed light on contemporary designs that may be locally made in this material. Wool chairs and loom chairs were the outcome, combining originality with contemporariness of traditional material and weaving patterns.
© Photos, text: Artist & A. M. Qattan Foundation
Nine art installations examining identity-shaping objects in the salons of Palestinian homes. 28 May - 31 Aug. 2022, A.M. Qattan Foundation, Ramallah.