Tracing Our Dragon's Smell

Tracing Our Dragon’s Smell

Tracing Our Dragon’s Smell

Tracing Our Dragon’s Smell Senior Student Exhibition | May 2015 Visual Cultures Program | Department of the Arts Curated by Shady Elnoshokaty

Myrna Abbas Yara Abdelbasset Monica Abo Shosha Sara AbouElWafa Tasneem Breaka Maria Ashraf Hanna Passant Ibrahim Yomna Nafea Mohamed Nour Lilly Nagaty Dina Said Malak Yacout Saleh Rawaa Sherif Cendrella Wael William Zeynab Zidane

Tracing Our Dragon’s Smell is the 2015 senior student exhibition of the Visual Cultures program at AUC. The exhibition presents fifteen projects created through a year-long process that started last semester (Fall 2014, ARTV 4269). The initial research-based process is continued in the spring semester (Spring 2015, ARTV 4270). Here students primarily work toward finalizing their research outcomes into art works. This final production phase, along with the first semester of research, is an integral part of the educational process.

Tracing is an act which motivates us to detect or try to prove the existence of something unknown. Applied to a creative idea, one which may suddenly and seductively appear and disappear in our mind, tracing involves the instinctual desire to follow its multiple associations and find what remains of it in our memory. The pace of this process changes throughout its various stages, shifting as different areas are accessed that were not known before. Similar to brainstorming as a learning methodology, in which numerous divergent threads of an idea are followed, reaching a definite result is often uncertain. The challenge is therefore to work through a large network of collected information and attempt to create a simple theory that unifies its elements.

Art is a massive and mysterious entity that confounds our senses and confuses our efforts to trace its impact. Constantly shifting and unpredictable, it combines all contradictions: the weight of mountains and the lightness of flight, innocence and spontaneity, realistic appearance and magical disappearance, amiable cartoon characters and destructive monsters with devastating flames of fire. In brief encounters, art overwhelms us with its immense expanse and its brilliant glare leaves us at a loss and in a constant state of questioning. It may appear again and again, coming from its world in our imagination and returning to us in moments of awe and wonder.

Our new Visual Arts program offers an integrated curriculum within a liberal arts context. It combines an interdisciplinary approach to art in a larger cultural sphere, with tools and methods borrowed from other disciplines such as the sciences, sociology, anthropology and history. The program is oriented toward visual research and production grounded in an exploration of creativity and a critical approach toward art and culture. The current senior year exhibition showcases one of the first and early outcomes of the new curriculum. Students have adopted a process-oriented conceptual approach and developed a variety of visual and performative languages in their multi-media work.

Shady Elnoshokaty

MEMORY AND THE ACT OF BECOMING Myrna Abbas b. 1992, Doha Medium: Video, HDV, 6 minute loop An existential theory, that humans form themselves based on their experiences which further down the line become memories. Some are more important than others; some are critical to our existence. Others are supplementary and would not have a fatal impact if they were to disappear. If this concept were to hold true, it would be grounds for us to be even more conscious of the fragility of humanity.

GOLD Yara Abdelbasset b. 1992, Cairo Medium: Photography, 3 digital prints, 70cm x 100cm each !‫!وروائح الجنان فى األوطان‬ !‫!ودعت قلبى ومالى قلب ثان‬ ‫!حكم الزمان فبئس زمانى‬

‫أجلوه عن وطن أحب نسيمه‬ ! ‫ودعته ودموع العني جارية‬ !‫وهجرته ال عن رضاى وإنما‬

Eyes filled with tears, forced to leave my land, a land that bore the scent of heaven My heart is where my land is, and have we not but one heart!

A departure thrown upon us by fate, a fate that cannot be escaped

AUTHORITY OF THE MIND Monica Abo Shosha b. 1992, London Medium: Video installation, kinetic wood structure, light, sound, animation, 7m x 7m We believe that our desires are formed in our minds, but they are dominated by our senses, masked by the illusion of passion.

Our bodies are animalistic forms that are driven by euphoria.

But such euphoria is ephemeral.

The mind confines what has been undone.

And so we live to seek equilibrium.

We live by control, restriction, and regret because of our need to find a companion.

But true freedom is to be alone, to be chaotic.

THE OTHER PERSON’S PAIN BROUGHT ME Sara AbouElWafa b. 1993, Cairo Medium: Interactive installation, light, soft sculptures, 5m x 5m Each second we live is a new and unique moment of the universe, a moment that will never be again and what do we teach our children? We teach them that two and two make four, and that Paris is the capital of France. When will we also teach them what they are? We should say to each of them: Do you know what you are? You are a marvel. You are unique. In all the years that have passed, there has never been another child like you. Your legs, your arms, your clever fingers, the way you move. You may become a Shakespeare, a Michelangelo, a Beethoven. You have the capacity for anything. Yes, you are a marvel. And when you grow up, can you then harm another who is, like you, a marvel? You must work, we must all work, to make the world worthy of its children.

- Pablo Casals

CANCEROUS DILEMMA Tasneem Breaka b.1993, Giza Medium: 5 sculptural objects, light, wood, 0.60m x 2m There is a notion that nothing is out of reach for cancer. All living things are prone to it; it’s not limited to humans, animals, fruits and vegetables.

MONSTER UNDER THE BED Maria Ashraf Hanna b. 1994, Cairo Medium: Video installation, drawings from animation projects, TVs, wood, sound, 3m x 4m He who does not doubt the roots, lives a slave under the shadows of the leaves.

He who does not delve into the days of yore, will never find the truth.

He who lives by the ghastly sword of truth, dies by the sword.

CONFLICT OF CONTRADICTIONS Passant Ibrahim b. 1994, Cairo Medium: 6 digital prints (framed), wood, light, 4m x 3m You will see that most of us are in conflict, live a life of contradiction, not only outwardly, but also inwardly. Contradiction implies effort. Where there is effort, there is wastage—there is waste of energy. Where there is contradiction, there is conflict. Where there is conflict, there is effort to get over that conflict—which is another form of resistance. And where you resist, there is also a certain form of energy engendered—you know that when you resist something, that very resistance creates energy.

All action is based on this friction that I must and I must not. And this form of resistance, this form of conflict, does breed energy; but that energy, if you observe very closely, is very destructive; it is not creative. Most people are in contradiction.

And if they have a gift, a talent to write or to paint or to do this or that, the tension of that contradiction gives them the energy to express, to create, to write, to be. The more the tension, the greater the conflict, the greater is the output, and that is what we call creation. But it is not at all creation. It is the result of conflict. To face the fact that you are in conflict, that you are in contradiction, will bring that quality of energy which is not the outcome of resistance.

- J. Krishnamurti, The Book of Life

SELF-PORTRAIT Youmna Nafea b.1992, Ismailia Medium: light, wax sculpture, video screens, wood structure, 3m x 9m I shall praise those faces which seem to project out of the picture as though they were sculptured, and I shall censure those faces in which I see no art but that of outline.

- Leon Battista Alberti

CATATONIA Mohamed Nour b.1993, Alexandria Medium: Video installation and music performance, 11 digital video screens, 3m x 4m zugzwang: the necessity of moving in chess when it is to one’s disadvantage German, from zug pull, tug + zwang force, coercion, akin to Old High German ziohan to pull and dwingan to press, oppress, compel (Merriam-Webster online)

IMAGINATIVE LIFE Lilly Nagaty b. 1993, Cairo Medium: photograph, fabric, 3m x 4m One is obliged to admit that perception and what depends upon it is inexplicable on mechanical principles, that is, by figures and motions. In imagining that there is a machine whose construction would enable it to think, to sense, and to have perception, one could conceive it enlarged while retaining the same proportions, so that one could enter into it, just like into a windmill. Supposing this, one should, when visiting within it, find only parts pushing one another, and never anything by which to explain a perception.

- Gottfried Leibniz, Monadology

ANALOGY OF INNER STATES Dina Said b. 1993, Cairo Medium: Drawings, ink on paper, 120cm x 140cm each ‫عند اختالل املنظومه السيكولوجيه للحس االدراكي تنهار القدره علي السيطره فيقفز الالمرئي من القاع الي السطح‬ When an imbalance in the psychological system of awareness of the senses occurs, a deterioration of self control is triggered. In turn, the unseen is unleashed.

TEMPORAL SEMIOTICS Malak Yacout Salah b.1993, St. Louis, Missouri Installation: concrete, wood, diagram prints, sound, 13m x 7m The social implications of translations help us to identify the translator and the translation researcher as a constructing and constructed subject of society.

- Michaela Wolf

THE CEREMONY Rawaa Sherif Three-channel video installation, sound, light, 6m x 4m They seek to eternally grow, never to cease. What if they’re meant to be somewhere else, somewhere where satisfaction and fulfillment can fathom an eternal orgasm, an ageless face, an unceasing gratification of true purpose?

THE MYSTERY SPOT Cendrella Wael William b. 1992, Cairo Painting installation, acrylic on canvas, 7m x 3m There were a lot of reports about near-death experiences, which frequently constituted perceptions of forthcoming death, a feeling of disconnection from the physical body, and a diversity of other divine phenomena, according to a recent Gallup poll.

JUVENILE Zeynab Zidane b.1993, Cairo Installation: wax, bronze, light, glass, 4m x 3m The accumulation of atoms is configured differently in various forms and times. Atoms take up different spaces, yet all have the same bases. The power in their components all resonates with the same rhythm and vibe, the rhythm of existence.

In, out, on and seen. Power.

Tracing Our Dragon’s Smell STUDENT RESEARCH

Myrna Abbas Yara Abdelbasset Monica Abo Shosha Sara AbouElWafa Tasneem Breaka Maria Ashraf Hanna Passant Ibrahim

(Memory and the Act of Becomming) (Gold) (Authority of the Mind) (The Other Person’s Pain Brought Me) (Cancerous Dilemma) (Monster Under the Bed) (Conflict of Contradictions)

Yomna Nafea Mohamed Nour Lilly Nagaty Dina Said Malak Yacout Saleh Rawaa Sherif Cendrella Wael William Zeynab Zidane

(Self-Portrait) (Catatonia) (Imaginative Life) (Analogy of Inner States) (Temporal Semiotics) (The Ceremony) (The Mystery Spot) (Juvenile)

MEMORY AND THE ACT OF BECOMING Myrna Abbas Premise Presented An existential theory, that humans form themselves based on their experiences which further down the line become memories. These memories, or moments if you will, make us the people we are and the people we will become. Some are more important than others, some are critical to our existence.

Others are supplementary and would not have a fatal impact if they were to disappear. If one were to really think about it, the realization that we, as humans, are made up by a very delicate, very breakable, string of memories can be quite overwhelming. If this concept were to hold true, it would be grounds for us to be even more conscious of the fragility of humanity.

First Step Toward Research To reach down into the deepest pits of the mind and recall a first memory; the rudimentary remembrance of oneself.

Chubby, infantile hands crawling. Fingers curling against dark red carpeting and tearing tiny bits toward mouth.

After which, more memories continue to seep through. Some inconsequential, others triggering other memories. Writing down all of the memories that come to mind, whether trivial or not, becomes crucial. All of these could be conceived as mere reminiscences. All the recollections are subjective, after all, and therefore might have been internally altered throughout the years on some level of the subconscious. These factors aside, if a larger power

were to somehow wipe them from the mind, would one remain the same?

Following the idea that identity is based on events and our recollections of them, according to Amin Maalouf in his book On Identity, the term identity, were it a person, would be a complete fraud. He claims that “we all think we know what the word means and go on trusting it, even when it’s slyly starting to say the opposite.” Maalouf also goes on to explain how crucial the question of one’s identity has been throughout history “from Socrates’ ‘Know thyself!’ through countless other masters down to Freud,” that the matter of knowing one’s true self has pretty much been in question since the dawn of intelligence. Then Maalouf states something that brings one to a halt: to think of approaching this very delicate topic today would be biting off more than one can chew, and therefore he chooses to take a more modest approach in his book and discusses why people do what they do and why people are what they are, without stumbling into the Socratic twilight zone of trying to define humanity.

And this is where the idea struck: creating an art piece of identity based on memory, without trying to define identity or search for an answer about oneself.

This art piece, though it would be based on one’s personal experiences and afflictions, would not be a selfish way of providing oneself with closure, and it would certainly not be a therapeutic method in which one tries to find oneself in the process. This piece will be a representation of an idea.

Personal Memory Timeline From very vague, seemingly insignificant memories to longer, clearer, more essential ones. Choosing a medium other than film seemed lacking, as visual and audio representations are needed, as well as movement.

Andrei Tarkovsky’s The Mirror depicts the thoughts, emotions and memories of Alexei and his world as a child, through his adolescent years and then as an adult. Much like my own intended approach, Tarkovsky drew a lot upon memories of his own childhood. This film as well as Tarkovsky’s Nostalgia provided more methodical information as to how to go about filming, with methods such as panning of the camera, events occurring outside the camera frame, sounds that are incompatible with visuals, the element of time represented in sound, and the use of delusional or vague dialogue.

Eija-Liisa Ahtila’s film If 6 Was 9 narrates the minds of young women, uses three-panel shots and editing, and also touches upon sexual themes such as self image and self exploration. It provided some inspiration, although it was too scripted, which is an approach to avoid.

On the other hand, Jean-Luc Godard’s Numero Deux provided inspiring ideas, such as editing using parallel framing and the heightening of outside noises (similar to Tarkovsky’s style) and discussing the idea of how children perceive sex, a topic which will naturally be touched upon slightly in the piece. The film also depicts humans as machines, and how a woman’s body is like electricity, emptying and recharging itself.

Following research at Medrar for Contemporary Art, I was able to explore short films or video art including Borja Rodriguez Alonso’s Why, representing the racist, sexual, and infantile curiosities of humans in the depiction of a Google search engine; Emilia Izquierdo’s Caged (Loop I), an animation depicting the repeated actions of a man in jail trying to free himself; David Keltner’s The River, a silent movie animation loosely based on the Ancient Greek myth of the Styx river which formed a boundary between

the living and the dead; Rembrandt Quiballo’s Blow out, which features a collection of YouTube videos uploaded by American soldiers; Jagrut Raval’s Melting Time, depicting a frozen clock and its thawing process; Esmeralda Kosmatopoulos’ Banana Republica-Sleeping Beauty, which questions the way in which individuals may be tempted to trade part of their identity in exchange for material comfort; Dana Duff’s Catalogue, a silent black and white film looking at a catalogue containing desaturated photographs shot and printed to look like a 1950s film; and Sandra Araujo’s Runtime Error, an animation mashing up and deconstructing game spaces. These short films provided interesting editing technique ideas and were also a reminder to stay away from making the film too didactic.

This thorough process of research has provided a

rich foundation upon which one can build a short film.

By observing the various modes of representation, ideologies and depictions of different postulations of these writers and artists, one is able to move forward with screenwriting a film and casting the actors who will represent the timeline of memories, depicting memory and the act of becoming.

REFERENCES Amin Maalouf, On Identity Andrei Tarkovsky, The Mirror and Nostalgia Eija-Liisa Ahtila, If 6 Was 9 Jean-Luc Godard, Numero Deux Pico Iyer, Nowhere Man Valérie Archeno, Performing Rituals

GOLD Yara Abdelbasset For most of the modern world, Nubia seems an unknown and enigmatic land. Only few people know about its history, cities, temples, and cemeteries that once dotted the landscape of southern Egypt and northern Sudan. Nubia’s remote setting in the midst of an inhospitable desert, with access by river blocked by impassable rapids, has not only lent it an air of mystery, but also isolated it from exploration. Over the past century, particularly during this last generation, scholars have begun to focus more attention on the fascinating cultures of ancient Nubia, ironically prompted by the construction of large dams that have flooded vast tracts of the ancient land (Fisher, p.1) The term Nubia defines a geographic region that is located in the northeast corner of Africa, encompassing the southern end of Egypt and the northern half of the modern country of Sudan.

Straddling the Nile River, it is sometimes referred to in two parts, according to the direction the river flows, lower Nubia in the north and upper Nubia in the south. Stretching along the winding course of the Nile River for nearly a thousand kilometers, the area is also sometimes called ‘The Middle Nile.’ The area is further divided by a series of rapids, called cataracts, which served as boundaries for different regions within Nubia. The first cataract is at Aswan, where Nubia begins, and the last one, the sixth, is north of the modern city of Khartoum. (Fisher, p.5) Scholars still debate where the name Nubia came from, but it is tempting to see its origin in the ancient Egyptian word for gold, ‘nub’, which would be fitting,

since Nubia had the ancient world’s richest supply of gold. Other names the Egyptians had for Nubia included ‘Ta-Sety,’ which means ‘The Land of the Bow.’ Undoubtedly because the Nubians, rather than farming, relied on hunting for food and became very skilled with the bow and arrow. Indeed, depictions of Nubian archers are found not only in Egyptian art, but show their fame reached even into the Mediterranean world. (Fisher, p.6) Right before the building of the High Dam, Nubians were asked to leave their lands, as they would soon be flooded, and immigrate to deserted lands called Nasr El-noba, which is located 60 kilometers away from the city of Aswan.

Although Nubians see this tragedy of losing their homeland as a sacrifice for the sake of their beloved country, they believe that they have been completely ignored and marginalized by several successive governments since the time of President Gamal Abdel Nasser. A significant example of this unfair treatment is the land that they have been given after their immigration. They had been promised fertile and rich land like the land they had previously lived on, however, they were given very arid, desert land that looked nothing like their original home, to the extent that they called it “Hell Valley”. Not only didn’t that land feel like home for the Nubians, but it also lacked the essential utilities for life like power and sanitation.

Plans for a new high dam at Aswan were made first in 1946 and finally implemented beginning in 1960.

The dam was completed in 1964 and represents one of the greatest Egyptian national achievements since the pyramids, as it controls the once irregular flood and provides electrical power for the many villages that line the banks of the Nile. However, it was recognized that the effects of the dam would not be entirely positive, as the expanded reservoir would submerge still more of the Nubian lands. (Fisher, p.57) In fact, the immigration process started in 1902 upon the building of Aswan’s tank and well before the building of the High Dam. Ten villages had flooded

and Nubians voluntarily immigrated to different governorates all over Egypt. Later, on the 18th of October 1963, more than 28 villages were flooded and 18,000 families were forced to evacuate their homes and immigrate to the hill of Koom-umbo. The whole process ended on the 22nd of June 1964.

Several Nubians who lived through the process of immigration describe the way it was approached as completely humiliating and inhumane. The conditions of the buses and ships used to transfer people were unbearable, to the extent that many Nubians died on the way including the elderly and children.

Even when they reached their new land, they found that most of the houses were under construction and were not finished yet, which made them spend nights in the open air. Under these circumstances, many children were not able to endure and they died.

Mr. Ameen, an 83-year-old man who lived during immigration, states that “there were so many children who died on our first few days in the new lands to the extent that we had a full cemetery for children and newborn babies only, which is significant evidence that the process of transferring people was conducted under inhumane conditions.” Although there was a lot of money coming from international funds for the Nubians’ immigration, it was directed towards transferring the Nubian monuments with very little attention to the Nubian people. Even when it comes to compensating Nubians for their loss, the government was really restrictive in determining the budget. Mr. Fawzi Gaber, the international representative for the case of Nubia, says that each Nubian was given only 10 piasters for each palm tree which covers almost nothing of the expenses of starting a new life.

The Medium Henna originated and was introduced to the world

through Nubians. It is very linked to the Nubian culture and traditions. Nubians use it in different occasions like weddings, celebrating a newborn, and even sometimes in funerals.

Henna is the Semitic language word for the plant Lawsonia Inermis. A paste is made of pulverized henna leaves, and the body art is then created with that henna paste. Henna contains a dye, Lawsone (hennotannic acid, 2-hydroxy-1, 4-naphthoquinone), that stains skin, nails, and hair a dark blood-red color. Crushing fresh or dried henna leaves with lemon juice or some other acidic liquid makes henna paste. Henna paste is applied to skin, fingernails, or hair. When the henna paste is left on for several hours, the keratin and collagen become thoroughly saturated with Lawsone. When the paste is removed, an orange stain remains. This stain darkens to deep reddish brown over 48 hours.

REFERENCES Fisher, Marjorie M. Ancient Nubia: African Kingdoms of the Nile. Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2012.

Jones, Catherine Cartwright. “Menstruation and Henna: Pollution and Purification.” Kent State University. Web. Accessed 13 Feb.2015.

AUTHORITY OF THE MIND Monica Abo Shosha …when we are young…we tend to speak quite quickly, without thinking too much about what we are saying, while as time goes by, talking becomes more and more difficult since the things that we say come from deep inside us and acquire so profound a meaning that it seems better to remain quiet.

– Massimo Camisasca The relation between the mind and the body is complex and problematic, as one is tangible whilst the other is abstract, immaterial, and invisible. For centuries, scholars, scientists and philosophers attempted to locate the soul or the mind, and understand how it functioned in relation to the body.

The body is a chaotic and animalistic form that is driven by its senses and weaknesses, whereas the sane mind is the home of reason, power, and authority. Driven by the concept of mind and body dualism, this project portrays the mind as an authoritative nucleus that controls and restricts the body. A weaker mind loses control over the body creating conflict between reason and opinion, ethos and pathos. The body wants to explore its spaces and senses without understanding its boundaries or limitations, whilst the healthy mind is able to restrain the body through rationality.

Rene Descartes believed that if the mind is distanced from its authoritative state of logic and reason, the more probable one’s inaccuracy and misjudgment will be. Therefore, the mind must be guarded from the “confusing images of the senses” which cloud its

verities. Furthermore, according to historian Philippe Ariès, young children are trained and disciplined in preparation for adulthood “…. and the “public world”.

(McMahon, pp. 68-71). It is the body that is viewed by the public world, not the mind, thus it is essential to discipline the mind to be able to control the body.

As children’s minds are less developed both biologically and spiritually, they are less able to judge and reason. This is why we do not place blame on children for doing something wrong as we would an adult. Thus authority of the mind over the body is something that is developed as we age and are able to understand and remember. We remember the errors of the body as mistakes imprint in our minds, preventing us from repeating them.

The pain one experiences by placing a hand over a flame leaves an imprint in the mind, enabling the understanding and reasoning for why this action is wrong and should not be repeated.

Aristotle also shared this idea of mind-body dualism and questioned the reason why one would do anything other than the “right” thing, if one is aware that this action is indeed right. Aristotle called this inability of the mind to control or guide the body “akrasia”, literally meaning “lack of mastery” (Kraut, Alternate Readings of Aristotle on Akrasia).

Ultimately, an akratic person does not follow and abide by his understanding of reason due to the influence of “pathos”, meaning emotion or feeling, referring basically to the bodily senses.

Furthermore, due to this connection between the mind and body, we can become confused as to which is guiding us. We assume that our desires are formed in our minds, however they are motivated and influenced by our senses. Thus we cannot deny that the mind and body are connected despite their dualistic separation, but we do not recognize these

sensual and bodily motivations as they are masked in ideas of desire and passion.

Furthermore, the euphoria from sensual actions is short-lived and once the action is complete, one experiences remorse and shame as the mind processes the faulty action. Aristotle explains that in order to overcome or prevent akrasia (and become “enkratic” or act in harmony with reason), one must “possess the ethical virtues, and these qualities require complete emotional mastery.” (Ibid). The mind must be able to control the body by claiming authority over the bodily senses.

The difference between the mind and body is similar to that of morals and laws, as legal rules are changeable “at will, as circumstances require” while moral rules however are more concrete and straightforward. (Shavell, Law Versus Morality as Regulators of Conduct) The complexity and density of morals are limited and therefore less susceptible

to loopholes, as “a moral rule against lying that incorporated too many and too complicated categories of exception would be difficult…to learn and might challenge the intellect of many.” (Ibid) Furthermore, if lying was treated as a legal issue that had many exceptions, one might not immediately know their legal obligation. Thus, similar to the mind’s authority, morals are more direct but can be swayed and clouded by the influence of bodily senses.

The mind as a direct and straightforward mechanism can be equated to the function of a machine. Mental imagery, recollection and valuation are areas of the mind that are triggered by elements that surround us and are formed due to events and causes through methods that are almost mathematical.

Plato’s likening of the mind’s memory function to impressions in wax tablets resembles the function of a printing machine. (Nigel, Plato and his Predecessors).

Our experiences are imprinted in our memory as an ongoing machine that enables us to restrict, grasp and control our senses through the mind’s ability to reason.

This idea is also influenced by Robert Fludd’s diagram of the mind, dividing it into different sections that are correlated to the body as well as to each other. The sections are labeled the sensitive and imaginative, the cogitative and valuation (which includes understanding and reason), and the memory. This visual image itself is analogous to the machinery and mechanism of clockwork.

The portrayal of the body and/or mind is similar to the works of Marcel Duchamp (The Large Glass) and Matthew Barney (Cremaster), as both Duchamp and Barney were influenced by very sensual or biological

forms in creating mechanical and mythical pieces.

Furthermore, the idea of combining these two highly contradictory and formally opposing aspects (the undefined form of the mind and the highly defined form of a machine) itself portrays the obscurity of the relationship between the mind and body. The final piece portrays a somewhat Freudian view of the function and form of the mind, with a direct split between the conscious and unconscious, realism and surrealism. (Foster, Art Since 1900).

REFERENCES Camisasca, Massimo. "You Cannot Live Without Authority."

Fraternity of Saint Charles. Fraternity of St. Charles Borromeo, 16 July 2009. Web. 9 Dec. 2014.

Foster, Hal. Art Since 1900: Modernism, Antimodernism, Postmodernism. New York: Thames & Hudson, 2004. Print.

Kraut, Richard. “Alternate Readings of Aristotle on Akrasia.”

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. n.d. Web. Nov. 2014.

McMahon, Jennifer L. The Philosophy of Tim Burton. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2014. Print.

Southwell, Gareth. “Descartes and Substance Dualism.”

Philosophy Online. n.d. Web. Nov. 2014.

Shavell, Steven. "Law Versus Morality as Regulators of Conduct." American Law and Economics Review V4 N2 (2002): 227-57. Print.

Thomas, Nigel J. T. “Plato and his Predecessors.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. n.d. Web. Nov. 2014.

THE OTHER PERSON’S PAIN BROUGHT ME Sarah AbouElWafa Every one of us makes mistakes. Every one of us has his or her own thoughts. These thoughts could be good or bad. They are based on something bigger. When we look at it from the outside, it could be from an old experience, from the way others treated us, or often from our parents during childhood.

Trying to get out of a problem do we not see the details and just focus on what made it happen? Was it because we are bad? Are we criminals? Is it our genes? Do we try to eliminate all of that and just focus on where the issue started? Is it an old experience? Even if it is, we just want to live, forgive and forget.

Each problem is not just what we see. It is based in a negative energy that is located inside of our bodies.

It transforms into different sensations including pain, hurt, trauma, and many others. The questions that we need to ask ourselves are: How can we heal it? Is it even possible? How can we get out all of the negative energy from the inside to the outside?

It all comes from inside of our human body.

In order to let it out, we need to communicate. Can we live in a world without speaking? Can we live in a world without our natural way of communication? Did anyone try to let it out through creating a new way of communication? Looking at babies in a ball pool and how they communicate, can one do the same? Does

this inspire you?

It all comes from inside of our human body.

Looking closely at our human bodies, organs and cells, we focus on the nerve cell. The function of the nerve cell in the human body is to receive messages from all the parts of our body and send them everywhere. It is the cell which creates a way of communication in our body.

The nerve cell is a unique cell that contains neurons, nerve impulses, and neurotransmitters. Our nervous system contains millions of nerve cells, called neurons. Neurons are highly specialized to transmit messages from one part of your body to another. All neurons have a cell body and one or more fibers.

These fibers vary in length from microscopic to over one meter. There are two different kinds of nerve fibers: fibers that carry information towards the cell body, called dendrites, and fibers that carry information away from it, called axons. Nerves are tight bundles of nerve fibers.

Using the inspiration of kids’ games and research on the nerve cell, I am trying to create a new way of communication in the form of an installation with a mission.

It is a performance based on sharing the moment, using a new method of communication to integrate humans and fulfill the need to feel existent. To be perceived, even for a brief moment, to show to everyone his or her love, honesty, encouragement, and care. To share any kind of emotions they might be having. There are no boundaries. All participants are asked to simply be themselves: be beautiful, be angry, be happy, be sad, be anything you wish for.

REFERENCES Lewandowski, G. (n.d.) “The Dark Side of Oxytocin.” Retrieved February 11, 2015 from <http://www.scienceofrelationships.com/home/2014/4/30/the-dark-side-of-oxytocin.html> Neto, E. (n.d.) “Ernesto Neto: The Body That Carries Me.” Retrieved February 11, 2015 from <http://ernestoneto.guggenheim-bilbao.es/en/> Williams, J. (n.d.) “What Are Nerve Cells? Function, Types & Structure.” Retrieved February 11, 2015 from <http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/what-are-nerve-cells-function-types-structure.html#lesson>

CANCEROUS DILEMMA Tasneem Breaka Cancer is a very common disease, and its death rate rises every year. The way people look at life and their perspective toward everything changes with each step they take into the disease, from surgery on a tumor to knowing that the kind of cancer they have is fatal. The fact that cancer itself is a fatal disease, and that anyone who is diagnosed with it has a 50/50 chance of survival, enhances this change in perspective, even if the type of cancer they have can be treated with surgery. People start looking at life from another perspective, the perspective of a person who hasn’t got that much time in our world. This could be a pessimistic perspective or an optimistic one, depending on the person. This new perspective, however, is always related to life’s pleasures.

Life’s pleasures are basically desires that, if fulfilled, would cause a specific amount of dopamine to be released into a person’s brain. This would make a person who is suffering from cancer hold on to life, as their mind would understand and experience it directly rather than seeing it as an abstract idea.

Considering cancer, a dangerous and dramatic disease, as something that links a person to their desires and the need to hold on to life and its pleasures is a way to make one think of the bigger picture, rather than just the small things that we concern ourselves with and brag about in our everyday life. It is a way to point out the fact that people just look underneath their feet where they are standing, and refuse to look in front of them where the core of life really stands clear.

solution to communicating this concept. The incentive spirometer is a medical device that measures a person’s lung capacity. It is usually used with people who have just had surgery, or who are suffering from an ailment affecting their lungs. Using the incentive spirometer is a kind of practice to increase their breathing capacity.

Using an incentive spirometer offers a tangible

The device itself is composed of three balls in three

different tubes, each ball corresponding to a better breathing capacity. It actually looks like a toy. This object that measures the life of a person appears to be just a toy, a plastic tube with small colored balls inside it. However, it holds the life of a person with every breath they take. Each tube could represent a stage of life, and each stage of life could represent a phase that a person goes through based on their personal experience. When the ball moves toward a

better stage of breathing, the personal experience of the individual is improved, and when it moves toward a weaker stage, the personal experience of the person is worse.

Cancer can also be linked to our cycle of life from a very realistic perspective. Today, we are at risk of developing an abnormal cell from almost anything around us. The air we breathe, the food we eat, our lifestyles and diets, even the wrong medication can trigger an abnormal cell to develop. The human body produces 2,000 abnormal cells regularly, but in a healthy body these cells get destroyed the moment they are produced. However, anything can go wrong at any moment, and a cell may not get destroyed properly. Every day, each person is at risk of developing a fatal disease because a cell that we

MONSTER UNDER THE BED Maria Ashraf Hanna We live in constant unrecognized pain, concealed beneath a facade of fleeting moments of happiness, fake smiles, forced laughter and chaotic silence.

We never pay attention to the darkest places of our souls, the demons that are in constant conflict with us as we try as hard as possible to fight them to break free. Our fears and lies, our anger and regrets, our worries and tears, our shame and lust, our dishonor and fear of the future weigh us down as we choose to live in constant conflict with them instead of breaking free. The demons control the constant battle of the mind, and so every little detail of past experiences becomes significant in the process of understanding ourselves.

I chose to set myself free and color my demons, disregarding their ugliness. Demons being evil spirits, fallen angels that possess a person and indirectly control their life and lock down their soul. They penetrate down to our mistakes, regrets and weaknesses and dim all beams of hope. They trap us into thinking that we are unworthy and irrelevant, and after a while we begin to love their problems and fear recovery. When one has struggled for so long, one doesn’t remember life without the inner demons of their soul.

Fear waters the demons as their roots dig deeper into our souls, although fear is nothing but a vital response toward the unknown. Even so, we tend to glorify the unknown, giving it power over ourselves

without facing it.

It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell. - Buddha Fear is initiated from two different sources: real life and imaginary life. We all carry both inside of us, but as we grow older, the fear of real life increases while the fear of imaginary life decreases. Real life fears are made up of everyday and occasional threats, such as failure, abandonment, death, fitting into society, love, attachments, commitments, etc. Such fears are what occupy our minds most of the time, causing stress and long-term harmful side effects.

As children, fear is born “under the bed” or “behind the curtain” or even “inside the closet”. According to child psychology experiments, fear is implanted in children starting at the age of two. Two-year-olds fear the darkness and anything that is different from what their eyes are used to seeing might seem frightening.

Imagination is one of the highly effective factors initiating fear. It is the faculty of forming new ideas, images, and concepts of external objects that are not present to the senses. Imagination enables fantasizing, which is the activity of creating and imagining things that are farfetched and which cannot possibly exist in reality.

Children have very wild imagination channels, as

their visual cortex is highly alert. The visual cortex is the sector of the brain responsible for the imagination. A child’s imagination is incredibly persuasive, leaving the child fighting all day with imaginary monsters and having tea parties with imaginary friends. Everything the eye catches during the daytime is reflected in an exaggerated manner during the nighttime, either through dreams or nightmares. One of the highly influential factors impacting children’s cognition is cartoons and movies. Their sugarcoated, unrealistic stories and characters play a negative role on the child’s imagination process during the nighttime. Disney is one of the biggest child brainwashing factories in this field. With its dazzling, colorful and sweet characters, it is able to captivate the attention of many children, taking them to a “whole new world” on a “magical ride” to the imaginary place of “Neverland”.

What most Disney lovers don’t know is that Disney movies are rewrites of Brothers Grimm stories. The original stories were brutal, cruel and aggressive, with dramatic and terrifying endings compared with Disney’s sugarcoated “happily ever after” endings.

If Disney were compared to the Brothers Grimm, Disney would be feeding on happiness, dreams and imagination, while the Brothers Grimm would be feeding on children’s fear, cruelty, and aggressiveness.

With the given ugly reality about the Disney stories, I decided to uncover the big Disney sheet of illusion about happy endings with the real cold truth. A series of cartoon animations, each created single-handedly, illustrates the authenticity of life through the understanding of the Brothers Grimm.

Some people think that the truth can be hidden with

a little cover-up and decoration. But as time goes by, what is true is revealed, and what is fake fades away.

- Ismail Haniyeh The disturbing relationship between the colorful, sugarcoated, and pretty characters of Disney and the choices they make is alarming.

Three of the most shocking story endings were chosen: The Little Mermaid, The Jungle Book and Sleeping Beauty. A series of “terribly ever after” endings.

CONFLICT OF CONTRADICTIONS

without anyone knowing that they were father and son. Knowing the shocking truth that the caliph was gay, the man agreed to leave his son as a prisoner and the caliph gave him money as indemnity. So the man took the money, left his son and returned home.

This book, Maqamat Al Hariry, was read in public in a magmaa’ (a group of people sitting in a public place were someone who could read would read them a book or a story), but at this point the illustration of the story included only two figures, one of which was of an old man and the other of a young boy. The two figures were depicted gesturing as if talking to someone, perhaps to each other.

Passant Ibrahim What are the Islamic arts? One might think that the Islamic arts include only Islamic architecture, typography and patterns. This is simply due to the fact that most general Islamic courses teach this one concept, that Islam, God and the prophets are only represented by these three types of art. In addition, some Muslims consider any other kind of art to be off-limits. When one searches Google or any other search engine and writes the two words “Islamic arts”, he/she will find the results to be about architecture and patterns or calligraphy on buildings. Still, there is a lot more in the field of Islamic arts than those three things. There are paintings of people and scenes of everyday life on the walls of buildings and on plates and coins, etc. Most important of all are Islamic miniatures that are found in many non-religious books. If one gets into more detail and studies Islamic arts in more depth, he/ she will discover that in these Islamic miniatures there are portrayals of humans, animals, and even prophets.

These miniatures developed from simple paintings of houses and landscapes that were painted on the walls of buildings. Then these simple paintings became paintings of laborers at work. After this, paintings in the private baths of some caliphs came to reflect the joys of life, depicting women and wine. Naturally, in the beginning these paintings had no perspective and the figures were very basic and stiff, even

though specialists analyzed some of these paintings and determined them to be of women dancing and pouring wine into glasses. Afterwards, these types of paintings were included as illustrations in books.

One of these books is Maqamat Al Hariry. One of the maqamat tells the story of a man who needed money and went to ask the caliph for help, but the caliph refused and threw him out of the castle. After a while, the man made an agreement with his son to try to fool the caliph. They staged a fight in the market and the guards took them to the caliph

Afterwards, the graphic depiction of stories changed.

Not only did the story have sexual references, but the illustrations also began to have sexual content.

However, the details of the female body were never shown, as can be seen in the depiction of wedding night scenes. Typically, in the miniatures which illustrate weddings, the scenes are divided into two sections: the inside scene that shows the bride and groom together, and the outside scene that shows the wedding celebration. This division is obvious due to the architectural frame that surrounds the inside scene. In the inside section, the sexual scene is depicted by making the two figures, the man an§d the woman, dissolve together as if they are one figure. Similarly, in another miniature depicting a woman giving birth, the woman has her legs spread out while she is half nude, but the artist does not show any details of her body. She is smooth as if she has no reproductive organs. In contrast, miniatures that depict male nudity or sex among men always show the complete male body.

In such scenes, the male body is always shown even if the figure is not fully nude or is wearing full clothing, and sometimes only the penis is depicted.

Some illustrations contain male nudity without an

apparent need for it in the scene, for example in a typical courtly scene. On the other hand, as mentioned before, female nudity was almost never depicted. In addition, almost all scenes that represent same-sex intimacy are depictions of male love. This may be because Arabs are very protective and reserved concerning women. One theory says that the reason that homosexuality was accepted at the time was because after the death of Prophet Muhammad Muslims started to declare a lot of things to be forbidden and off-limits, including women.

Normally, when a boy a grows up in a community in which he sees and deals with no women, he grows up liking what he has always seen and what he has

always had, and of course he would disregard what has been prohibited.

Furthermore, according to Rock Faces, Opium and Wine: Speculations on the Original Viewing Context of Persian Manuscripts, sometimes artists tended to be high or drunk while painting miniatures. Such a theory has not yet been proven, but it is still a possibility. What happened is that they used to get in majlis (a place where people would gather to celebrate a certain event by drinking and eating). The theory says that artists who painted while intoxicated would give their paintings a dreamy feel, and that this effect would also influence the viewing audience.

These actions–homosexuality, the refusal of women and the use of drugs–are things that were prevalent during a time with no technology and less sophisticated knowledge. Then what about the time of the twenty-first century, with advanced technology and more knowledge? In this time these three actions are still occurring. As shocking as it is, Saudi Arabia has the highest percentage of gay men in its population. Saudi Arabia has formed a community in which women are still a forbidden desire, and all is said to be under the name of Islam. In such a community, women are not allowed to drive, to work, nor are they allowed to walk the streets alone without a mehrem (a man who is the woman’s father, brother, grandfather, uncle, father-in-law or husband).

However, according to an interview with a gay Saudi Arabian man, he acknowledged that in Saudi Arabia being gay is easier than being straight because the punishment for being with a woman is to be sent to death, while the punishment for being with a man is three years in prison and four hundred and fifty lashes on the back. Saudi Arabia is known as the country of Islam since it has the Ka’aba and it was the country of the Prophet Muhammad. Even so, it is a country where the halal is forbidden while taboos are accepted. Such a community exactly proves the statement of this paper, which is the contradiction that has always been present in Islamic communities: the contradiction of what is hidden and what is shown.

Many artists have worked on the same concept of this paper, like the Egyptian artist Ghada Amer.

Ghada Amer has worked on a series of erotic paintings of women. She uses a technique where she draws or paints the erotic without it being the first thing you see. In most of her erotic painting she covers the figures with strings. These strings seem to be like a kind of a curtain that somehow hides what is underneath, which is basically my topic. She found

a way to represent the issue and also represent its contradiction.

Since these contradictions are ancient from the beginning of history, it will be convenient for such a project to be done using the old techniques of the miniatures. The point is to combine the old traditional technique with the new contemporary concept or idea. In addition, just a few artists worked with the technique of the miniatures, which will make this project more creative and new to the audience.

The miniatures themselves include almost all kinds of Islamic arts such as typography, patterns, architecture, colors, plants, animals, and human figures.

SELF-PORTRAIT Youmna Nafea This project is about a self-portrait through time, how time changes frames of the self-portrait and how the self itself does not exist. The self-portrait consists of what it looks like now, how it looked in the past and the process that shaped it up to the current moment.

The artist here analyzed the changes from phase to phase and frame to frame, by documenting what she had remembered from the past until now. She labeled these phases and defined the documents into definitions in order to get similar images related to them. Those definitions, in order, are trauma, anxiety, vulnerability, id, defense mechanism, and time. Time is the infinite frames or phases that people pass through that come with side effects and benefits.

Trauma is the beginning of any change, whether good or bad. The artist documented what she had remembered from traumatic scenes and collected videos and images related to this documentation.

Anxiety is a natural feeling that occurs after trauma.

For example, consider the traumatic experience when someone drives quickly and hits into another car. Afterward, she/he will be anxious when they drive a car or they wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t drive again. So anxiety is the stage when the person blames her/himself and feels restless every time they drive a car. The artist also supported this definition with images and videos related to it.

Vulnerability is experienced when someone feels insecure and anxious about anything around them

like crowds, people, and society. Feeling vulnerable is nothing but a step forward to reality. Vulnerability is not easy because a person often cannot adapt quickly. It therefore needs another timeline with more documentation.

By this time, the artist has lost her ego and her id has overrun her consciousness. Then the concept of self-denial comes from the id, to accept the fact of being totally naked and put a plastic shell over herself. This is called the defense mechanism, so her portrait now is not a self-portrait because this defense mechanism talks about this realization.

She researched all these different definitions and phases to come up with a medium, but she has many because she does not present one specific feeling or phase. She is talking about the process itself that leads to this result, and the state of mind involved in making a series of videos, comics, or games with different media. Together they act as a diary to explain the timeline of the current portrait.

The car idea is based on the urban body and how the car relates to the person. The artist decided to work on this idea using cars as the frame of the self-portrait and people inside it as the brain that

talks and reacts. The phases are the scene itself and the charactersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; body language. The shape of the car or the frame is the comfort zone of the character.

Another idea that explains the self-portrait is the inside and outside eye, or a comparison of phases of the self-portrait in relation to the right and left hemispheres of the brain. Here the eye can see the two perspectives, as if it is a door which people pass by, projecting what the artist does to herself. The two perspectives here are the switch between two phases: when a person switches from one phase to another and looks at a situation from the perspective of the first phase. They will find that they change

and others drew, songs that she used to listen to in the different phases of her life, pictures she took and diaries that she kept.

A third idea was to use seven different media to represent each phase and present them in one room: a neon quote representing ego, a sculpture representing vulnerability, a sound effect of soap bubbles representing anxiety, doom representing self, animation representing trauma, a series of photos representing the defense mechanism, and a heater representing the id.

The third idea is the strongest so far because it represents each phase accurately. For example, an object represents the idea of doom because it has a gravitational force that has purpose, so that every part of it remains connected. This is related to how people stick to a specific lifestyle in order to survive, reach a goal, or function in the world. Another medium that illustrates the defense mechanism is a series of photos of a personâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s laugh.

their perspective about the same situation in the next phase. The two eyes are like one room that a person faces when switching phases: like walking next to two doors of one room and seeing the same room from different perspectives. The two eyes also signify the left and right sides of the brain, the inside and outside eye, and the areas of the brain itself that determine traits and tendencies.

Through this the artist could present the series of portraits and the two sides of the brain to see the four dimensions: how something leads to another and how the person thought about it from the left and right sides of the brain. There is much documentation showing this including the self-portraits that the artist

To sum up, the artist developed the idea into a box with one eye looking on different pictures in various contexts. That project is just one eye or one perspective that shows some of the artistâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s traits philosophically in the current phase. In addition, the third idea may be the best so far because it illustrates every phase accurately, however it is difficult.

The project is about the self-portrait, and the artist thought about this subject to show that the idea of the self is an illusion and that people suffer more when they bear the burden of framing themselves and dividing their frames out of the whole image (which is all people and everything around them).

CATATONIA Mohamed Nour A pattern is a template, a distinctive regularity or repetition in the natural world or in human-made design. Every space has its regular changes that seem to be chaotic and unexpected in the beginning. All forms of life have patterns of movement, some the safe routes to move along in order to survive or go from point A to point B in a specific environment. Studying the rules of change, creating a time-based circle that shows what is going to happen at what time is the basic idea of all kinds of sciences.

The target of watching and studying things from a constant point is to come up with a pattern of movement, a few steps to follow in order to move from one constant point to another. Otherwise, one will remain in the center of a spinning wheel from which he/she cannot escape. “Man’s status in the natural world is determined, therefore, by the quality of his thinking.” (Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages) The first step in every movement is to study your surroundings. Like any mathematical problem, one has to start with constant inputs, a constant target, and a pattern of steps to solve the problem. By adding the element of time to these three elements, any problem could be solved, and any movement will happen.

As long as the constants exist, one will keep moving in a pattern that is flexible with the changes of his/her surroundings.

The question is what would happen if these

constants keep changing at a pace that one cannot cope with? What would the case be if there is no constant input? What would the case be if there is no constant pattern? What would the case be if there is no expected output? And what would the case be if there is no sense of time or space?

Zugzwang, a German word that means “compulsion to move”, is a situation in chess and other games where one player is facing the disadvantage of being forced to move when the safest option is not to move.

The result of being forced to move into an unknown pattern with an unknown beginning and an unknown ending would be an abnormality in movement and behavior. An abnormality arising from a disturbed mental state. An abnormality arising from not knowing where and when the beginning is, or where and when the end would be. It would involve a state of trance or seizure with loss of sensation and

consciousness. It would involve resistance to passive movement. It would involve negativism. It would cause an endless state of catatonia.

Through experimentation with surroundings, space and time-based media, the target is to create an interactive space that simulates the catatonic state.

The aim is to create a pattern of aesthetic motion that keeps changing in both pace and intensity until it turns into chaos and madness.

REFERENCE Hall, Manly P. The Secret Teachings of All Ages: An Encyclopedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Qabbalistic, and Rosicrucian Symbolical Philosophy: Being an Interpretation of the Secret Teachings Concealed within the Rituals, Allegories, and Mysteries of the Ages. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/ Penguin, 2003. Print.

IMAGINATIVE LIFE Lillly Nagaty Graphic art is the art of expression that allows the artist to create his own imaginative life. As we see in children who are left to draw freely, they begin to sketch their own opinion or view of the world. This imaginative life is different from real life as it is devoid of any responsibilities and therefore gives us more freedom. For an individual, this imaginative life puts them in any state they desire to be in. Take a child for example: in their dreams or imaginative life, they are a superhero and can save the world. They are the hero of their own world. Their sense of morality comes from the belief that they can save the world and that they will help everyone.

In dreams or under the influence of drugs, the state of the mind is altered. When a person is asleep, their brain functions much more actively then when they are awake and it can therefore take the person to hell or heaven. The imaginative life is not necessarily always fun and pleasant. Stronger than dreams comes the influence of drugs. When an individual is on drugs, they enter a world that solely exists in their mind, allowing them to connect their imaginative life to their real life. This can be breathtaking or it can actually take a personâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s breath.

In the case of a good trip, and a good state of mind, the person can experience their own heaven.

Everything that seems right and beautiful to them is connected to the real world, and the world becomes a perfect place for the duration of the trip. However, in the case of bad thoughts, everything becomes terrible. Instead of going to an imaginative world where everything seems perfect, the brain takes that individual to a living hell.

What makes the imaginative life so special is the clarity of its perception and vision. It allows us to explore more. In our everyday life, because of its fast pace, people tend not to focus on everything they see or read. For example, when you are at a shop looking for shirts, you first begin to skim through all the different styles until you find a section that satisfies you. You then begin to pick your most desirable shirt by observing the items closely regarding fit, style, look, design and so on. In our normal life, we have no time for the clear perception that the imaginative life has; we only have time to look closely at what means more to us. In the imaginative life, whether we chose to daydream about it or access it more vividly through drugs, we begin to see a normal tree for example as a breathing organism with a soul. This is but a small example of the clear perception that the imaginative life allows us to experience.

This clear perception is much broader than something you can just observe or see. In the imaginative life, emotions have a different effect on us as individuals. In our world we value emotions due to the reactions they cause, whereas in the imaginative life due to our increased perception emotions become valued for what they are in their essence, not because of their results.

ANALOGY OF INNER STATES Dina Said You’re never really asleep, and you're never really awake. - Chuck Palahniuk When you sense that there is something incorrect and that it might be the start of a problem, wondering about these past few nights, barely getting any sleep.

You go to bed with the thought of getting a good night’s rest in mind, but little do you know that that’s not what’s about to happen. You end up just lying in bed, tossing and turning and waiting in the dark for the moment when consciousness gives up the struggle and you can get some rest. So you keep laying there for an incredibly long time and only get about two or three hours of actual sleep. And the clock still remains ticking.

Or perhaps it's something other than insomnia–to lie listening to people yelling in the streets as if you’re listening to music, to try to dream but succeed only in retention, to toss and sweat on a dirty sheet while you gradually refocus on the buzz of a fly, a fly droning as its shadow expands in the room. Is it insomnia for a person to conceal his eyes with a sleep mask, praying for another day to elapse?

Terrified to wake into another night?

Do you remember the last time you had a completely sleepless night? And how bad you felt the next day?

Try to imagine not sleeping for months. Nowadays, people have a habit of staying up too late and getting up too early. They tend to have their sleep interrupted with activities, chemicals, and work. They

overstimulate with late-night pursuits like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, television, games, etc. “Why can’t I sleep?” is a question that a lot of people ask themselves while they’re in bed. The reasons for it may be numerous. Generally, it arises from unhealthy habits that people continue to do before sleeping. A habit is an action that we do so often that it becomes an involuntary response. If it is undesirable, it is then considered a “bad habit”. These habits may not be bad per se, yet they have the effect of making someone unable to fall asleep.

It all begins and ends in your mind–what you give power to has power over you.

"Insomnia is almost an oasis in which those who have to think or suffer darkly take refuge."

- Rudolf Nureyev

“Why can’t I sleep?” is the first question we should ask ourselves in order to try to understand what we are up against.

According to Sigmund Freud, the most fundamental concept of psychoanalysis is the notion of the unconscious mind as a reservoir for repressed memories of traumatic events, which constantly influence conscious thought and behavior. The scientific evidence for this notion of unconscious repression is lacking, though there is sufficient evidence that subconscious memories and processes influence conscious thought and behavior.

Insomnia is having trouble falling asleep or staying asleep. A person who cannot get a good night’s rest and questions their lack of sleep suffers from this condition. It’s very common, although very few would even notice it and consider it a problem. But the fact that one has to ask that question already means that it is a problem, one that continues to plague you and occupy your mind while you’re in bed.

Insomnia can be classified as a transient (shortterm), intermittent (on and off) and chronic (constant)

condition. Insomnia lasting from a single night to a few weeks is referred to as transient. If episodes of transient insomnia occur from time to time, the insomnia is said to be intermittent. Insomnia is considered to be chronic if it occurs on most nights and lasts for a month or more. Certain circumstances seem to make individuals more likely to experience this disease, including advanced age and a history of depression. Women are also more likely to suffer from it. Insomnia is also linked to other conditions such as stress, anxiety, medical problems, or the use of certain medications.

Fatal Familial Insomnia (FFI) is the ultimate terminal phase of this disease. It is one of the rarest of genetic sleep disorders and inexorably steals the victim’s sleep, their mind, and their life. FFI is caused by the mutation of some genes that results in a

change in the structure of the DNA. Microscopic views show proteins triggered by genetic mutations creating prions. These abnormal proteins build up in the brain, developing clumps which destroy nerve cells and eventually leave sponge-like holes in the brain.

In FFI most of the damage seems to be in an area of the brain called the thalamus where the prions accumulate. The thalamus is the region of the brain responsible for the regulation of sleep. The accumulation of prions in the brain causes nerve cell injury and eventually nerve cell death. Damage to this area destroys the individual’s sleep onset mechanisms. This type of insomnia still remains a mysterious condition as its symptoms resemble common diseases. The main symptoms are inability to sleep, high blood pressure, excessive sweating, and the loss of coordination. FFI makes itself apparent in four

worsening phases during four months and the typical duration of it is 7-18 months.

So is insomnia an individual disorder or a civilizational plague? An alarming void? Or is it the effect of an unmanageable excess of responsibilities? Is this idea itself an exaggeration of the situation?

And soon all of us will sleep under the earth, we who never let each other sleep above it.

- Marina Tsvetaeva Will we ever find the sense of something–either of a human being, a biological or a physical phenomenon–if we lack the knowledge of the force which seizes, exploits or takes possession of the issue? A phenomenon is a sign, a symptom which finds its meaning in an existing force.

TEMPORAL SEMIOTICS Malak Yacout Salah Time is no strange concept; it seems to be everywhere. Works from classical, mimetic representations of a specific historical period to Russian Constructivist kinetic sculptures all seem to reflect an obsession with time. Examples include John Cage’s 4’33” performance and Hassan Khan’s G.R.A.H.A.M portrait, where time seems not to pass at all. György Ligeti’s Symphonic Poem for 100 Metronomes deals with a sense of rhythm, music and time. The concern with time is also present in Andy Warhol’s Time Capsules and Eadweard Muybridge’s photographs of humans and animals in motion. The advent of video art and time-based media also brings about new potential ways to address the concept of time. More recently, Christian Marclay’s The Clock shows excerpts of clocks and time from films, arranged minute-by-minute in a 24-hour long video.

Thus, it seems artists are obsessed with the temporal as well as the visual aspect of experience.

Just as this obsession with time is not limited to twentieth century art, it is not limited to art as a field.

The most obvious examples are studies related to physics and scientific research, such as Einstein’s relativity of time and space and the space-time continuum. Equally relevant are the efforts of medieval-era engineers and scientists to measure and “keep” time, inventing a range of timekeeping devices (including water clocks, mechanical clocks, oil clocks, sundials, and finally digital clocks) while simultaneously determining their own calendars based on astronomical observations or other methods. Needless to say, time is also an essential aspect of music, with its numerous

notations for pace, rhythm, tempo, and otherwise.

However, beyond such obvious associations, there are latent references to time in fields such as thermodynamics, including ideas of entropy and decay.

Calendars and clocks have refined ideas of timekeeping, based on astronomical observation, regular natural occurrences, or simple mechanical rhythm. Time is also a fascinating idea for sociologists and philosophers. For example, Timothy Mitchell’s ideas about the essence of modernity, in Orientalist ideas concerning a “timeless non-West” as opposed to the “modern West”, reflect this concern with ideas of “modernity” and time.

Conceptually, time is also relevant to John Stuart Mill’s ideas of history and “progress”.

In fact, there is a certain temporal aspect to linguistics, which becomes apparent in the rhythm of the individual of moras, stops, and stresses in language. This tends to be most clearly demonstrated in traditional readings of the Quran, or tilāwat al Quran, with all its rules and structures about when and how to pronounce what, when vowels are lengthened, when consonants are stressed, when to stop and take a breath, and when to continue without stopping. ʾAḥkām al tajwīd, the science and rules of reciting the Quran, is significant: each and every rule is clearly and repeatedly marked with its own symbol. The introduction of these symbols into Arabic writing may or may not have been intended to standardize Quranic recitation, which according to Mitchell’s definition of modernity

would suggest a modernizing initiative. Regardless, the effect is that the rhythm and tempo of the Quran is marked with certain symbols, which suggests not just a specific awareness of time, but also an initiative to attribute a specific temporal meaning to each symbol. In the end, these markers refer to issues of the semiotics of time, hence the name, temporal semiotics.

Structurally, these temporal markings in the Quran are repeatedly revealed in the architecture, Islamic patterns, and designs of artifacts from the same time period. For example, a page from a Mamluk Quran has a certain rhythm, which is then repeated in the patterns and designs of a dome of the Mamluk mosque-madrasa. Moreover, the structure of the Quran exhibits similar uses of

repetition and symmetry that are evident in Islamic patterns, design, and architecture. The various rules and rhythm of the different pronunciations include features like Qalqala, Idghām, Ghonna, Madd, and Waqf which take place. This depends on interpretations of the Quran and its readings.

Is it possible, then, that the Quran and its teachings has its own structural temporal language of rhythms, that is subconsciously and visually reproduced? Can this be applied to other ideologies and their visual constructions of themselves? Does, for example, the rhythm of the Marxist Manifesto of the Communist Party reveal itself in communist architecture in Russia, China, and Latin America? Are there structural parallels between the Bible and the paintings, architecture, and other visual

manifestations of the Christian ideology based on its time and rhythm? Does each ideology have its own temporal language that is revealed in its own visual manifestations?

Is there a relationship between the oral and the visual in Islamic doctrine and Islamic architecture, designs, calligraphy, and patterns? Can the sounds and rhythms of recitations be translated into architecture, form, and patterns? In turn, is it possible to translate the resulting architecture, form and patterns into sound?

THE CEREMONY Rawaa Sherif Spiritually, this is a complicated concept; a personal conflict that many experience. Who is this God that holds so much power? Is it wrong of me to ask? Why is it so terrifying for people to question their faith?

So many questions complicate our thought process.

What will people think of me? The label “ATHEIST” would be written all over me. Such a strong, violent and intimidating word, that a lot of us fear being placed next to our name. What happens in a time of need? Can I still pray for help? Or will I be forbidden of that privilege? Will my entire mentality change and will I lose faith in humanity itself? What about death?

Will I stop decorating it and placing it on a silver platter–to make it seem prettier, make it seem “alright”? If I’m wrong about my doubts, do I get punished after I die? And if I’m right, do I become an empty, worthless piece of flesh?

Research The above passage was what I started off with, contemplating the idea of belief and the personal anxiety that comes with it. However, the statement “empty, worthless piece of flesh” left a mark on me.

What does it mean to become an empty worthless piece of flesh? What I realized was that there are many ways to analyze this statement. There is the physical side of it and then there is the spiritual side, which is what I had initially intended. However, after researching the physical side I may have had a change of heart.

I started searching for what physically happens to the body after we die, and I found the six stages of decay. Even though the following is related to the pig,

I don’t believe the human body is that much different.

The six stages are: 1. A live pig is not outwardly decomposing, but its intestine contains a diversity of bacteria, protozoans and nematodes. Some of these microorganisms are ready for a new life, should the pig die and lose its ability to keep them under control.

2. Initial decay - 0 to 3 days after death. Although the body shortly after death appears fresh from the outside, the bacteria that before death were feeding on the contents of the intestine begin to digest the intestine itself. They eventually break out of the intestine and start digesting the surrounding internal organs.

3. Putrefaction - 4 to 10 days after death. Bacteria break down tissue cells, releasing fluids into body cavities. They often respire in the absence of oxygen (anaerobically) and produce various gases including hydrogen sulphide, methane, cadaverine and putrescine. The body inflates and forces fluids out of the cells and blood vessels and into the body cavity.

In other words, the pig has become bloated from the build up of gases within the body.

4. Black putrefaction - 10 to 20 days after death. The pig’s body has collapsed with the black exposed surfaces and creamy flesh. Large volumes of body fluids drain from the body at this stage and seep into the surrounding soil. Other insects and mites feed on this material.

5. Butyric fermentation - 20 to 50 days after death.

The pig is now very flat and beginning to dry out. It has a cheesy smell, caused by the butyric acid, and this smell attracts a new suite of corpse organisms.

The surface of the body that is in contact with the ground becomes covered with mould as the body ferments.

6. Dry decay - 50 to 365 days after death. The pig has been reduced to hair and bone. The body is now dry and decays very slowly. Eventually all the hair disappears leaving the bones only.

Another thing I came across are the human decay steps. Here they are in brief: 1. Your cells burst open.

2. You turn white and purple.

3. Calcium makes your muscles contract.

4. Your organs digest themselves.

5. You may be covered in wax.

This last step caught my attention. After putrefaction, decay moves quickly to turn the body into a skeleton.

However, some bodies take an interesting turn on the way. If a body comes into contact with cold soil or water, it may develop adipocere, a fatty, waxy material formed from the bacteria breaking down tissue.

After all this research about body decay after death, my thought process continued. All these steps until the body is basically absent led me to thinking about all the steps and rituals we take in our lives, whether they are daily or something that we rarely do. In terms of religion, this would include rituals such as the Islamic wudu’, or ghusul, and also praying and the Hajj. For Christianity, it could include

baptism. All these rituals lead to the idea of preparing to go to another place cleansed and ready for a new life.

Another interesting ritual is the preparation of a young woman before marriage in the Middle East.

The physical rituals she has to encounter, whether it’s Arab waxing (body sugaring), or all the oil treatments just so that her body can be perfect and ready for her husband.

Concept I decided to create my own ritual, with a concept and belief system behind it. I created a persona that believes humans weren’t meant to be on earth, that we came here by accident and that our true destination is our afterlife. The ritual that this persona does is to speed up his/her life. It is a ritual that is self-destructive, in order to speed up the process and get to their true destination faster.

However they cannot use drugs, alcohol or any deviant substance in this destruction. Their death must be clean and natural without using anything unnatural.

a video of many people performing the ritual all at once. I would like the video to be split onto three different screens in a small dark room. The videos will be silent with no audio. I plan to have voice-over audio of a middle-aged man discussing the belief system behind the ritual. The reason that I am choosing a man of this age is so that his intellectual and mature manner would have a convincing effect on listeners.

The most natural and pure, sometimes even holy, substance is water. Water will be a main factor in the ritual. After doing a lot of research, I found that water could be used in many ways in self-destruction: 1. Water Intoxication: drinking too much water. It can flood the nervous system and kill brain cells (by drinking over one liter per hour).

2. Brain Hypoxia: lack of oxygen, e.g. drowning.

Even if you survive, this condition kills brain cells if you are deprived of oxygen for a long period of time.

It could also cause temporary memory loss, reduce your ability to move your body, and result in difficulty paying attention and making sound decisions.

Recovery challenges include insomnia, hallucinations, amnesia, and muscle spasms.

3. Head Banging: shaking the head rapidly. It causes axons to tear, which causes brain cell death.

I am planning to involve all of these aspects in my ritual. Water is the purest and most holy substance on earth. Not only is it used for cleansing, it is also used in a lot of religious rituals such as baptism, wudu’, and ghusul. Using such a holy and pure substance is the definition of a clean death.

Presentation I am planning on presenting video art. I would make

The following is the script of the audio voice-over: So you ask me, what is it you believe in?

My answer is death.

Life is an imbalanced and disproportionate idea. A formidably false life that is, with all the beautiful and ugly promises it has to offer. The radiance of the sun’s warmth on the skin, the sound of the ocean waves crashing onto the shore, the love, the lust, the fame, and the fortune. Life is one big ball of distortion that grows with every passing minute. All these fallacies, all these illusions, that life is some extraordinary place to live in. How futile is it to walk around with no sense of bother? What an imbalanced world, an unjust one! All the false pretentions claiming that the bad makes one appreciate the good, and that the good compensates for the bad are all delusional. This is pseudo imagination; false hope. It is a deception that was engraved in genetics so that the idea of living in a contradictive society is passed on from one generation to another. Children are raised confused, being taught that “it all happens for a reason”, and to “appreciate what they have” and to aspire to “have big dreams and be happy”. Generations are raised with happiness innately engraved as being the essence of gratification. And what for when happiness eventually transpires, is it what they thought it would be or has imagination surpassed

reality? No, see, humans crave what they can’t obtain; they constantly feel like something is missing even once their threshold is achieved. The form and soul weren’t made for something as insignificant and miniscule as life. With all its complications and desires, it is never enough. People perpetually seek more. They seek to eternally grow, never to cease. But there comes a point when life does make way. Death forbids them from their infinite plans and dreams. They come to the epiphany that everyone is supposed to die; it’s written in the skies and people observe this on a daily basis. Everything denatures, decays and perishes. Great humans too, they age, decay and they perish. Death is the only certainty in life. It is the only thing with universal consensus. It is what all primal fears stem from.

What if that fear of death dissipates? Nay, death becomes the be-all and the end-all and the ultimate destination. What if life isn’t the place to be? What if all predestined purposes in life are all misconceptions? What if man is meant to be somewhere else, somewhere where satisfaction and fulfillment can fathom, an eternal orgasm, an ageless face, an unceasing gratification of true purpose? What if man ought to change the lifestyle to accommodate this new life that awaits?

One should not just wait powerlessly until time is finally up. People should eagerly speed up the process. Living a senseless life will not suffice as it is not the natural cycle. Death must be clean, death must be organic and by means of natural degradation. The belief system allows only for denaturing not dismantling.

I wrote this passage in an intellectual manner, in order for the man to sound convincing. The man is not necessarily an actual man. The passage is written in the third person, referring to humans as if the man talking could be anything. He might not even be human. This adds a holy aspect to the issue.

THE MYSTERY SPOT Cendrella Wael William The process through which I started my project was searching about how ancient Egyptians used to mummify bodies, then it changed to their belief about the afterlife and how they used to put gold, accessories, food and other things for the dead to be ready for the next life. In my research, I also looked at myths of the afterlife in different cultures and religions.

According to an article entitled â&#x20AC;&#x153;Scientists simulate near-death experience and see what the dead seeâ&#x20AC;?, people who are drugged may experience an out-of-body experience due to stress or various diseases. Among women in labor, every tenth woman experiences this type of sensation while giving birth.

They feel that they are floating on top of their bodies and that the pain stops for some time and then suddenly comes back again. In China, Huang Wei-pin created a death theme game for people to experience what it is like to be cremated and to experience death. It is a 4D experience where people play a game and both winners and losers get to experience what it is like to be dead.

My research then proceeded to how artists including Donald Mclntosh, Maciej Mizer, Dominik, and Emil Alzamora worked on the topic of the afterlife. I also studied the Barzakh, which is what separates two worlds. In some traditions, it is believed peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s souls go from one body to another and that we all live many different lives. In one example, a little girl said that her name was different in a previous life and that she had kids and lived in a house. In order to make sure that her story was true, people asked

the little girl for more details about that other life.

They then realized that the people and places she had described had really existed in the past, but that the people had died and the place had been renewed.

Lastly, I conducted research on forensic entomology, where they use insects to estimate the time and cause of death. This information is used in crime investigations. It is with no doubt that everyone and every living organism goes through the life cycle of birth and death. During the decomposition of a dead body, insects are attracted to the smell of the dead flesh. Surprisingly, these insects can help determine the time and manner of death of the person or animal. This is determined by what these insects feed on in the body. For instance, usually the first insects that are attracted to the dead body are blowflies, which feed on liquids in the body. When there is no more liquid in the body, it is no longer suitable for the blowflies. Then the flesh flies and house flies are attracted to the semi-liquid body. As the body dries, it is the turn for the cheese flies and coffin flies to feed on it. Then, when the body becomes very dry, the maggots can no longer chew the remaining material. This is when the hide beetles, ham beetles, and carcass beetles use their chewing mouthparts to devour the dry flesh, skin and ligaments. Some of these include the carrion beetles, the Dermestid beetles, and the Rove beetles. There are also other insects that can be found. Lastly, the moths, larvae and mites eat the hair and the bones are left to collapse over time. The relationship between the dead body and the insects

REFERENCES Geobeats. “10 Things You Didn't Know About Body Decomposition.” 28 August 2014. Online video clip. YouTube. <https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=v2DJLehDAus>.

demonstrates the idea of the life cycle and how when a living organism dies, another lives. To illustrate this more, the blowflies lay their eggs on any injury or natural opening such as the mouth, the nose and so on. Then after a period of time, the eggs hatch and form into larvae which feed on the body. In this process, the survival of a group of living organisms depends on the death of another organism.

In order to apply this research into a project, it is first important to know the stages in which the body decomposes. Then the insect can be used as a starting point and as a symbol for the process of dying and survival on the death of other organisms.

Insects will be the focal point in this project. There are different ways in which this project can be done.

I can create paintings using different colors than the real ones of those insects. I can also bring a piece of meat inside a box of glass or wood (like the coffin) and leave it to rot to get a glimpse of what happens to us when we decompose. I can also take pictures of decomposing intestine meat at home. Since the intestines consist of cells that do not die when the person dies, the decomposition process starts in the intestines. Then I can present this in the gallery.

Therefore, my project can take the form of a life experiment.

Boggan, Steve. "Tunnels of Light. Meeting with Dead Loved Ones... the Truth about Near-death Experiences." n.p., 9 May 2011. Web. 25 Nov. 2014. <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1385027/Revealed-The-truth-near-death-experiences.html>.

Carter, Chris. "Science and the Afterlife Experience." The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology. V46 N2 (2014) Print.

"Facts: What Happens to a Body After Death." Memorial Pages. 2005. Web. 9 Dec. 2014. <http://www.memorialpages.co.uk/articles/decomposition.php> "Forensic Entomology." Web log post. n.p., 2009. Web. 9 Dec. 2014. <http://sciencespot.net/>.

"Forensic Entomology or the Use of Insects in Death Investigations." SFU Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, 2010. Web. 9 Dec. 2014.

Gousseva, Maria, trans. "Scientists Simulate Near-death Experience and See Whaåt the Dead See." Pravda.ru. n.p., 7 Sept. 2007. Web. 25 Nov. 2014. <http://english.pravda.ru/science/mysteries/07-09-2007/96865-near_death-0/#>.

Stokes, Douglas M. Reimagining the Soul: Afterlife in the Age of Matter. Jefferson: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2014. Ebook. Web. 25 Nov. 2014.

Wong, Maggie Hiufu. "'Death Simulator' Attraction to Open in China." CNN. n.p., 13 Aug. 2014. Web. 25 Nov. 2014. <http://edition.cnn. com/2014/08/10/travel/china-death-experience/>.

JUVENILE Zeynab Zidane Every day of your life you move through systems of power that other people have made. Do you sense them? Do you understand power? Do your realize why it matters? Power is something we are often uncomfortable talking about. Talking about power we often find it frightening; sometimes we find it evil and we feel uneasy naming it. What is power? Who has it? How does it operate? How does it flow? What part is visible and what part is invisible? Why do some people have power and others do not?

Fear and Power There is a belief that there is a correlation between fear and the amount of power people seek. An individual’s motivation for power is to acquire control over his or her environment. A certain amount of controlling behavior is a healthy natural survival instinct, but after a point it becomes harmful. When that happens, normal survival is no longer the motivator. Underlying the quest for power is fear, and the desire for power is to eliminate fear. The more fearful a person is, the more control they believe they need to exercise over their environment.

Think of the Nazi school, the political party that controlled Germany from 1933 to 1945 which was led by Adolf Hitler, “an evil person who wanted to use power to control and harm other people especially because of their race, religion, etc. … [and who] wanted to hold power by controlling one kind of species by hybridization.” He was motivated by something more powerful than political influence.

Therefore, there is a relation between power and fear, which makes some people think of creating

a stronger power, when maintaining survival is not seen as sufficient.

Camouflage One day people hope to gain the ability to vanish or disappear, as it is a special power that humans have so far not been able to realize.

Camouflage is the use of any combination of materials, coloration or illumination for concealment, either by making animals or objects hard to see, or by disguising them as something else. Examples include the leopard's spotted coat, the battledress of a modern soldier, and the leaf-mimic katydid's wings.

A third approach, motion dazzle, confuses the observer with a conspicuous pattern, making the object visible but momentarily harder to locate. The majority of camouflage methods aim for crypsis, often through a general resemblance to the background, high contrast disruptive coloration, eliminating shadow, and countershading. In the open ocean, where there is no background, the principal methods of camouflage are transparency, silvering, and countershading, while the ability to produce light is among other things used for counter-illumination on the undersides of cephalopods such as squid. Some animals, such as chameleons and octopuses, are capable of actively changing their skin pattern and colors, whether for camouflage or for signaling.

A pattern may be something you see and don’t recognize. It represents something that is related to you, and may also be a way to discover something that is hidden deep within your imagination.

REFERENCES Caughey, John Walton. “What They Say about The Angels W. W. Robinson.” Pacific Historical Review: 114. Print.

Halsey, Claire, and Inc Kindersley. Baby Development: Everything You Need to Know. New York: DK, 2012. Print.

Moyse, John S. "Threat of Vanishing Premium Suits Lingers.”

National Underwriter Life and Health-Financial Services Edition.

18 September 2000. Print.

Portmann, Adolf. Animal Camouflage. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1959. Print.

Sanchez, David. “The Miracle Of Human Creation (Where Do Babies Come From).” 19 Apr. 2013. Online video clip. YouTube. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8Ki2ywyo04> "Weird Human Deformities." Deformed People and Deformed Babies. Nerdygaga. Web. 23 March 2015. <http://www.nerdygaga.com/178/weird-human-deformities-2/> "What Are Angels?" Catholic Online. Catholic Online. 23 March 2015. Web. <http://www.catholic.org/saints/angels/>

Tracing Our Dragonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Smell EXHIBITION VIEW

Š The American University in Cairo, Department of the Arts, Visual Cultures Program

Published in conjunction with Tracing Our Dragonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Smell Senior Student Exhibition, May 2015

Curated and supervised by Shady Elnoshokaty

Visual Cultures Program Director: Bahia Shehab Visual Arts Major Director : Mia Jankowicz Sharjah Gallery Director: Kaya Behkalam Publication Editor: Nada Shalaby Publication Design: Noor Ibrahim Photography by: Shady Elnoshokaty and Kaya Behkalam Curatorial Assistant: Marwa Benhalim

The Visual Cultures Program provides the home for interdisciplinary study in theory and practice across the three individual majors of visual arts, graphic design and film. Established within the Department of the Arts in 2011 in response to the increasingly interdisciplinary character of visual creative practice in the 21st century, it offers courses that facilitate research-driven creative practice and the critical study and conscious use of diverse visual media in cultural context. www.aucegypt.edu/huss/arts/visualcultures/

Visual Cultures Program | Sharjah Art Gallery | AUC Center for the Arts Department of the Arts | The American University in Cairo AUC Avenue, P.O. Box 74 | New Cairo 11835, Egypt Email: arts@aucegypt.edu | Phone: 20.2.2615.1281