Curated by Lebanese video artist Akram Zaatari, and originally presented by the Internationale Kurzfilmtage Oberhausen, Radical Closure features works produced in response to situations of physical or ideological closure resulting from war and territorial conflicts. The program looks at what is known as the Middle East, and how the moving image has functioned throughout its history, charged with division, political tension, and mobilization. This 5-DVD box set has an accompanying monograph with curator’s essay, and features important work by 24 artists including Guy Ben-Ner, Harun Farocki, Mona Hatoum, Walid Raad, and Elia Suleiman. Many of the titles on Radical Closure are being made available to educational audiences for the first time.
Named after Hatice Güleryüz’s haunting short film, with its disturbing yet iconic images, this program presents unsettling situations narrated with both considerable emotional investment and critical distance. In her work Intensive Care, Güleryüz films a boy’s circumcision, then tilt’s up to the boy’s silent, angelic face. In another work, The First Ones, she films a group of school children singing the national anthem; a take on nationalism made with so much love. Marwa Arsanios’ I’ve Heard Stories reconstructs an incident that happened, or maybe didn’t, in the mythical Hotel Carlton. Mahmoud Hojeij takes a humorous look at the few hours he and his Lebanese friend spent with two Israeli men in Paris, evoking years of wars, occupation and division between the two countries. I, Soldier presents a poetic portrait of a soldier, while at the same time embodying a silent critique of nationalism, patriotism, and defense. Finally, Elia Suleiman looks at the role film has played in the Arab/Israeli conflict, and evokes the futility of rising nationalist and religious identities in a war situation.
