FINAL EXHIBITION

PARA AQUI O PARA LLEVAR

Having completed the full course at Metafora,  all the students had the chance to exhibit a selection of their projects. The title of the exhibition, "para aqui o para llevar", means "for here or to go?" and was inspired by the fact that most of the students had to decide whether they wanted to stay in barcelona after the end of the course, or to go back to their home countries.

the design theme layout i developed for the exhibition

some pictures from the exhibition..

WHERE ARE YOU FROM?

Project theme: Body and limits

EU citizens
If you are an eu citizen planning to live and work in spain you can do so for a period of up to 3 months before you have to register yourself.
Non EU citizens
If you are a non eu national applying for a visa to spain then you will need to start the visa application process at the embassy of spain in your country of residence.
It is likely that in order to be successful in your visa application for Spain that you must attend the embassy of Spain in person, where you will be interviewed and asked to provide evidence of your ability to fund yourself in spain. This usually means producing a bank statement or a hotel reservation in Spain.. If you intend on remaining in Spain past the duration allowed on the visa then you must report to the local police station in Spain and apply for a residence card.


Where are you from?

My experience in wanting to stay and work in spain after my student visa finished, and finding it very hard to do so because of my nationality, has led me to so many questions and wonderings about this issue. How can us wanting to be somewhere, be limited by where we're from? As human beings, are we only identified by our citizenship and be given a chance accordingly? Why can anyone from europe stay in the country they want with no complications, and someone from lebanon and more than 20 other countries can't?
In my "Body and limits" themed project, i used my own body with the stamp "Libano" on my back, to portray how we are sometimes, in certain situations, labeled, stamped, and limited according to where we are from. My being from Lebanon has limited me from being or going to places i want to go to and be in, and i am only one example between so many others.
For me, my nationality has become like a stamp, or a tattoo, that will be on me for life, i can accept it, love it, and let it be part of me, but sometimes i feel the need to remove it and be who i want to be, where i want to be, with no complications, no limitations..

presentation day..

BETWEEN PARENTHESIS

Project theme: Site specific / Time and space

Walking down the busy streets of the city, one shop after the other, people going in and out with shopping bags, (an old man on the corner of a high end clothing shop holding a sign that says tengo hambrre, no tengo dynero, no tengo trabahar, aydame porfavor *), and waiters bringing trays of food out to the sunny terraces. Strolling further down, more shops, clothes, beauty, souvenirs, (a woman next to a cash machine, her head down holding a cup up begging for money). Reaching a plaza in the center, people having coffee, strolling along, having ice cream, (a musician sitting on the side playing his guitar with a cup in front waiting for people to appreciate his music)...
When we read a book, a newspaper, or a magazine, we sometimes stumble upon words or phrases between () parentheses, which are phrases or words inserted as an afterthought into a passage that is grammatically complete without them. We then have the choice to read or to skip through them.
In my site specific project, i take the parentheses from their normal context, into the streets, placing them around situations such as the old man in the corner, the old lady begging or the musicians, and taking a series of pictures to portray how in our everyday lives, walking down the streets, we make that choice of "reading or just skipping through".
Although the project is not complete yet, and i will still be working on it and going more out to the streets, above is a short video documenting the experience.

* the sentence is written in the exact same way that it was written on the old man's sign, with the spelling and grammar mistakes, which means: i'm hungry, i don't have money, i don't have a job, please help me..

working on the parentheses sculptures, and welding for the first time...

  

presentation day... between parentheses

LANGUAGE IN THE ABSENCE OF VOICE

Exhibition at Untitled BCN gallery, Barcelona

collaborative project

Theme: Urban identity

What does it mean to be urban? to have an urban identity?

Having just moved to barcelona and trying to find our place within it, me and Lottie Heffer my friend at school decided to show our own experiences in this vibrant new city.

In our first collaborative piece, Language in the absence of voice, we addressed the limits and boundaries of communication. Playing with depictions of emotion through the juxtaposition of form and colour, this piece touches on the evocation of frustration, anger and solitude in a chaotic and disharmonious urban landscape.

We projected 4 different representations using our faces and different materials in between.

at the exhibition..

CUT... RIP... AND PASTE

Project theme: Beyond dreams

Dreams, hopes, aspirations... how and where do they come from? are they from us, within us? or are they the result of all that's around us? how big can they be? and when do they become overwhelming and lead us to losing ourselves in them, and losing touch with our own reality?

For me, aspirations are from us, but they are affected by everything around. What we see and hear in the media, what our parents aspire for us, what we draw from their own aspirations, and what our society and surrounding give us.

Whether it is to keep the pieces, to throw them away, or to create from them a new "collage" of dreams and aspirations, is up to us.

The whispering we hear in this video is in arabic, mainly talking about what the person is aspiring to, dreaming of, and losing him/herself in.

video projection: 37''

presentation day..

SHHH

Project theme: Minimalism

My shoulder, my back, my hip, my leg, my mouth, my nose, my eyes, my face, my body, they're mine and no one else's.
If i have the utmost right for anything, it would be what i can, can't, want, or don't want to do with my own body. I am the ruler of it and no one else.

The subject of women's rights in all aspects, always ignites an intense debate, and strong reactions from people around the world.
In my video piece i touched on the subject of a woman's body in its purest form, and the "violence" that can sometimes be acted on it, whether it is physical violence, emotional, sexual or mental. Covering it, forcing it to be unseen, wanting it, rejecting it, objectifying it, without her consent, without her opinion.

WOMAN

i'm lebanese

i'm a woman

i'm arab, i'm phoenician

i'm a woman

i'm muslim, i'm christian

i'm a woman

i love, i hate, i desire

i'm a woman

i'm sexual, i'm sensual

i'm a woman

i'm conservative, i'm provocative

i'm a woman

Project theme: Culture, identity and prejudice

Coming from beirut, a middle eastern city, to barcelona a multicultural european city, has showed me how at a time when exchanges between the diverse cultures at all levels are progressively intensifying, cultural stereotypes still exist in different ways.

It has showed me how to the western society, someone coming from the middle east or the "arab world" is instantly considered muslim.

Therefore the stereotype: lebanese, arab, muslim, veiled or covered, conservative in all aspects and on all levels.

Taking off from that point, i started exploring more how arab women are portrayed, as opposed to my own identity. And how in a way, a veiled muslim woman has become the symbol of arab women. But in the end, regardless of religion, regardless of the external forces and conditions that shape my identity, i'm a woman, sharing the same natural, sexual, emotional feelings and desires as any other woman.

In my project i explored the combination of western and arab cultures, the exterior, the interior, the visible, the hidden, the conservative, the provocative, and combined them all together using arabic style letters typography to form the word "woman". I used cardboard as material, and wrapped it with one layer of black lace on one half, and thicker with more layers of lace on the other half.