Presented as part of “Museum as Hub: Beirut Art Center,” organized by guest curators Sandra Dagher and Lamia Joreige.

“Closer” is a video program that features works from the last decade drawn from personal and intimate stories, creating a space to reflect on experiences both common and unique, familiar and without precedent, public and intensely private.

The program is divided into three parts. The first part presents videos that explore new narrative forms with the city of Beirut as the main setting. The second part focuses on works that use photographs as a base for narration, hence reflecting on the relation between still and moving images. The third part features works specifically based on personal archive material, audio, and VHS tapes that are all related to the Lebanese wars.

All these works shake our notions of reality by fictionalizing intimate stories and/or situating the artist as the subject/object of the work itself.

PART 1

Akram Zaatari Red Chewing Gum, 2000 Arabic with English subtitles, 10 min

Wael Noureddine, Ca Sera Beau - From Beirut with Love, 2005 Arabic & French with English subtitles, 29 min

Lamia Joreige, Nights and Days, 2007 English, 17 min

PART 2

Mireille Astore, Not From Here, 2006 1 min 30 sec

Ghassan Salhab, Narcisse Perdu, 2004 15 min Nadim Asfar, Print 1, 2007 English, 15 min Fouad Elkoury, Lettres à Francine, 2002 English with French subtitles, 43 min

PART 3

Rabih Mroué, Face A - Face B, 2003 Arabic with English subtitles, 10 min Anna Ogden-Smith The Dream (1989/2008), 2008 Arabic with English subtitles, 2 min 10 sec The Lie (1994), 2008 Arabic with English subtitles, 2 min 40 sec

Ahmad Ghossein, My Father is Still a Communist, Intimate Secrets to be Published, 2011 Arabic with English Subtitles, 32 min Commissioned by Sharjah Art Foundation