Basel Abbas and Ruanne Abou-Rahme / باسل عبّاس وروان أبو رحمة

2016-2019

Video
Materials: Three-channel video, two channel sound and subwoofer, wooden panels, duration: 10’ 05”

Collection: Courtesy the artists.

Basel Abbas & Ruanne Abou-Rahme’s installation Oh Shining Star Testify considers the entanglement between the destruction of bodies and the erasure of images, as well as the conditions under which these same bodies and images might once again reappear. The work is structured around Israeli military surveillance footage obtained and released by the human rights group B’Tselem. On 19 March 2014, 14 year-old Yusuf Shawamreh crossed the ‘separation fence’ erected by the Israeli military near Hebron. On his way to pick akub, an edible plant that is a delicacy of Palestinian cuisine, Israeli forces ambushed him and shot him dead. Oh Shining Star Testify weaves together a fragmented script sampled from online recordings of violent everyday erasures of bodies, land and built structures but also their reappearance through ritualistic song and dance. Whilst reminding us that there are landscapes beyond any notion of accountability, Abbas & Abou-Rahme’s use of these digital fragments prompt us to think about how technologies, particularly the internet, can provide a continued existence for those who have been killed.