I Heard You Laughing

Drinks 6pm, Screenings 7pm

Artists from the Middle East are often associated with narratives of struggle and rhetoric of the past. Some end up making works that are almost a response to some Western “tacit commission”–as coined by Moroccan scholar Mohamed Rachdi–arbitrarily linking authenticity with traumatic storytelling. I Heard You Laughing borrows its title from 14th century Persian poet Hafez’s book “I Heard God Laughing,” where he lauded the joys of love, humor and irony, three clogged pillars of Middle-Eastern culture that are making a controversial comeback in the works of a younger generation of artists from the region.

In conjunction with the upcoming exhibition “We Dance, We Smoke, We Kiss” at Fahrenheit (LA), Kadist welcomes Martha Kirszenbaum, Founding Director and Curator of Fahrenheit, and Myriam Ben Salah, Curator and Editor-in-Chief of Kaleidoscope magazine, for a screening and conversation around selected music videos from the 1960s and 1970s alongside video works by contemporary artists that reflect the complexities of this often oversimplified ‘East-West’ perspective. Following the screening, Martha and Myriam join Arash Fayez in conversation.

List of screenings:

Bendaly Family, Do You Love Me? , 1978, 3:32 min.

Abdullah Al Mutairi, InstaMedley, 2015, 2:04 min.

Meriem Bennani, Fardaous Funjab, 2015, S1 EP1 & 2, 14:38 min.

Fairuz, Laylit Eid (Jingle Bells), c.1965, 2:51 min.

Sarah Abu Abdallah, Out to Lunch, 2013, 9:54 min.

Dor Zlekha Levy, The Tarab Prince, 2014, 1:49 min

Fatima Al Qadiri and Khalid al Gharaballi, MENDEEL UM A7MAD (NxIxSxM), 2012, 15:50 min

Googoosh, Pishkesh, live on Manoto TV, 1972, 3:30 min

Martha Kirszenbaum (b. 1983, Vitry-sur-Seine, France) is the founding director and curator of Fahrenheit, an exhibition space and residency program in Los Angeles. She graduated from Sciences Po in Paris and Columbia University in New York, and worked at Media Department of MoMA in New York (2006-07), Photography Department of Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris (2007) and at the New Museum in New York (2008-10). Additionally, she collaborated with the Center for Contemporary Art in Warsaw, the Belvedere Museum/21er Haus in Vienna, Palais de Tokyo in Paris and the Kunsthalle Mulhouse. Kirszenbaum is a regular contributor to Flash Art, Mousse, CURA and Kaleidoscope among other publications, and has led seminars on curatorial practice at the Université Paris VIII and Parsons, Paris.

Myriam Ben Salah (b. 1985, Algiers) is a curator and writer based in Paris, where she has been coordinating special projects and public programs at Palais de Tokyo since 2009, focusing especially on performance art, video and publishing initiatives. She is the Editor in Chief of KALEIDOSCOPE magazine’s International Edition. She co-edits F.A.Q., a periodical image-only magazine with artist Maurizio Cattelan, and her writings have appeared in numerous international art publications. Her latest curatorial projects include Cool Memories (Occidental Temporary, Paris, 2016), Like the Desert Miss the Real (Galerie Steinek as part of « Curated-by », Vienna, 2015), Dirty Linen (DESTE Foundation at the Benaki Museum, Athens, 2015), Shit and Die (Palazzo Cavour as part of Artissima collateral program, Turin, 2014).