Impressions of Cairo

15 imprints on paper

Berlin, DE
2010

Impressions of Cairo is a paper work made of fifteen prints of walls in Cairo. In winter 2010, I visited Cairo, a city that has more citizens than Tunisia, the country where I was born. This metropolis is characterized by strong contradictions: tradition and modernism, culture and illiteracy, poverty and wealth, bureaucracy and spirituality. All voices fade through the noisy hustle of this melting pot, but if you risk a closer look at the walls, you will find the whisper of the people carved into stone.

I started to search for writings engraved in the walls of the Egyptian capital. As tools, I used a hammer and papers. I found a profusion of religious words and one sentence expressing sexual frustration, namely about homosexuality. Maybe the specific characters of urban habitats can be read on its walls. Their surfaces open new spaces where the inhabitants can express themselves through hardly visible mute discourses, and the walls become non-human actors within the society.

2-Dimensional

Media
Imprints on paper

Dimension
36 x 51 cm (each of 15)

Commissioned and co-produced by

Exhibition
Tatort / Crime Scene, 2010 at Christian Hosp Galerie, Berlin, Germany

Links
e-flux.com

Impressions of Cairo, 2010, installation view from Tatort/Crime scene at Christian Hosp Gallery, Berlin, Nadia kaabi-Linke

Installation
Impressions of Cairo, 2010

Exhibition
Tatort / Crime Scene, 2010

@
Christian Hosp Galerie, Berlin, Germany

Courtesy

© Photo: TiKL, 2010

Impressions of Cairo, 2010, installation view from Tatort/Crime scene at Christian Hosp Gallery, Berlin, Nadia kaabi-Linke

Translation of the engraved words in the panels above.
Impressions of Cairo, 2010

Exhibition
Tatort / Crime Scene, 2010

@
Christian Hosp Galerie, Berlin, Germany

Courtesy

© Photo: Uwe Walther 2010

Impressions of Cairo, 2010, installation view from Tatort/Crime scene at Christian Hosp Gallery, Berlin, Nadia kaabi-Linke

Installation
Impressions of Cairo, 2010

Exhibition
Tatort / Crime Scene, 2010

@
Christian Hosp Galerie, Berlin, Germany

Courtesy

© Photo: TiKL, 2010