Spray paint on paper 30*21 cm
Category: Works
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Coastal Chair
This project stems from a personal experience and a direct engagement with the complex political and geographical realities of Palestine. As a Palestinian from Jerusalem, I am subject to the laws of the Israeli state, which prohibit travel to neighboring countries in the north such as Lebanon and Syria, as they are officially classified as “enemy states.” To the south lies Gaza, which has been under blockade since 2007. This results in a nearly complete disconnection from the broader Arab coastal region.
During visits to the Mediterranean coastline in Palestine, I began collecting plastic and metal waste washed ashore — remnants of drink cans, canned food, and personal keepsakes. Many of these items bore traces of their origin, pointing clearly to Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza. Over the course of a year, I gathered only local, non-global commercial products.
These found aluminum objects were melted down and recast to produce a solid version of the iconic white plastic chair — a common fixture in seaside picnics and gatherings across the Eastern Mediterranean. The choice of this form was deliberate: the plastic chair has become an unspoken visual and cultural agreement shared by the region’s coastal communities, regardless of their political divides.
“Coastal Chair” is a work that combines design, sculpture, and political reflection. It raises questions of belonging, borders, and how material memory can embody a shared identity in spite of imposed separations.
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Chairs: Where the Human Body Meets Industrial Strength
To My Beloved Body,
What might happen if you accepted reality as it is and stopped resisting?
In this project, I approach my body, with all its physical and psychological complexities, as a material that can be redesigned. My body, characterized by its flexibility, rigidity, movable joints, and varying sizes and connections, is integrated with iron, a material that embodies the oppressive forces I’ve faced. Iron’s hardness and violence reflect the harsh realities of colonialism. By merging my body with iron to form a chair, I explore thirteen different ways this integration can occur. This transformation raises questions about endurance, identity, and human relationships. How long can one exist in this state? What are the implications of being used, and who will determine the conditions? The transformation into a chair deepens the emotional experience, heightening all senses as I feel the weight of the iron and the user’s presence. Intimacy and exploitation are intertwined in this context, measured by proximity, shared space, and the duration and weight of the user. The eyes remain the last human element, with the degree of exploitation increasing as eye contact is avoided. Cultural norms are broken, and new ethics and manners are created.
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The Anatomy Of The Human Body-Object
A research map that breaks down the body and reinterprets it from a singular entity into distinct parts, giving each part its own autonomy. This map challenges the concept of the human as a unified whole, instead viewing it as mere physical matter, which is then transformed into tools with specific functions. The visual identity was designed in collaboration with the designer Shaden Abdel Aal.
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LOVE DOSE NOT KILL
Falling in love, experiencing emotions with a naive and genuine nature, navigating the human experiences of selfishness and generosity, and encountering mistakes and broken hearts—these aspects change significantly when they occur within the context of an occupied city. The video presents the story of my love through images, text, and sound.
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TALK
In the family archive, there are text messages written in a mix of formal Arabic and colloquial dialects. These messages disregard traditional narrative rules, shifting between topics and blending them smoothly or violently, depending on the writer’s emotions. The writing style serves as a statement on the current situation. These letters discuss economic, political, and social conditions, and they are filled with emotions, gossip, and family secrets that traveled between the post offices of Jerusalem, Palestine, and those in Amman, Bern, Munich, and back. The video is a visual translation of these family texts, forming a “family portrait”.
