FREE
This program is online only (via Zoom, YouTube, and Facebook Live).
Advance registration is required for Zoom participation, including the chance to ask the artist a question (time permitting). After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the talk.

Join artist Dana Awartani and Hirshhorn curator Marina Isgro to explore how memory can help us remember our past and shape our future.

Awartani is a Saudi-Palestinian artist whose work engages the complexity of Arabian cultural heritage, often through practices associated with traditional craft. Her two-part installation I went away and forgot you. A while ago I remembered. I remembered I’d forgotten you. I was dreaming (2017) is on view in Put It This Way: (Re)Visions of the Hirshhorn Collection at the Museum through Fall 2023.

In it, a floor mosaic made of sand accompanies a large video projection of the artist sweeping away a similar sand installation in an abandoned home in Jeddah. Her gestures illustrate the slow layering of history and its erasure, whereby cultural identity becomes increasingly unstable. Through her art, she calls for a contemporary identity built alongside careful attention to the past.

SCHEDULE

11:50 am EST | Zoom broadcast opens

Noon EST | Dana Awartani in conversation with Marina Isgro

ASL translation will be provided on Zoom, and CART (real-time captioning) will be provided across all platforms. If you have any questions about accessibility for this program, please email [email protected].