Platform for discussion003
Can Artistic Practices Negotiate the Demands of Cultural Institutions, Public Space, and Civil Society?
Dictaphone Group is a collaboration between performance artist Tania El Khoury and urban researcher architect Abir Saksouk-Sasso, whose aim is to research specific urban spaces in Lebanon. Issues of public space and public amenities, or indeed the lack thereof in Beirut, come to the fore in Bus Cemetery, a sound-based intervention that took place at a 'cemetery' for disused buses in Beirut. An imagined guided tour in one of these abandoned buses, led by a gregarious female driver, takes the listener on a trip back in time to when the city had public transport, and on to the city of the present, with its lack of civic infrastructure and neglected public spaces, and finally asks: to whom does the city belong?
For full project see http://www.ibraaz.org/projects/19.
What is a platform?
A platform is a space for speaking in public. It is an opportunity to express ideas and thoughts. It also suggests the formal declaration of a stance or position on any given subject.
Unique to Ibraaz is a 'platform', a question put to writers, thinkers and artists about an issue relevant to the MENA region. This platform is sent to respondents both within and beyond the MENA region and contributions will be archived every 12 months.