Akram Zaatari

ARTIST STATEMENT/ POSTCARD PROJECT OF THE HOUSE OF WORLD CULTURES 2007 ´We create terms, trends, disciplines. We as artists, thinkers, political activists, struggle for our convictions, beliefs - at least - through our creations. While doing so, the existential question, the challenge for me, is how to make our thoughts, ideas, fragile enough not to dominate. The challenge is how to come up with ideas that melt, blend with others as some colours naturally fade against light.´ Akram Zaatari is a video artist and curator who lives and works in Beirut. He is author of more than 30 videos, among them 2003: This Day (86 min.). 2001: How I love You (29 min), Her + Him Van Leo (32 min). 1997: Crazy of You (27 min) and All is Well on the Border (43 min). 1996: The Candidate (10min), and the two video installations: Another Resolution, and Monument # 5: The Scandal. He is co-founder of the Fondation Arabe pour l’Image, Beirut, through which he developed his recent research-based work on the photographic history of the Middle East, which resulted in a series of exhibitions, among which are 2001: The Vehicle: picturing moments of transition in a modernizing society, Portraits du Caire: Van Leo, Arman, Alban. 2002: Mapping Sitting, on portraiture and photography with Walid Raad. He edited or co-edited three publications by the same titles. His writing was published in critical and scholarly journals such as: Parachute, Framework, Transition, Bomb, Al-Adaab, Al-Nahar, and Zawaya.