Body
Sharjah Art Foundation, in partnership with Air Arabia, presents ’32: The Rescore, the second annual Air Arabia Curator in Residence Exhibition. This research project and exhibition have been conceived by the 2019 Air Arabia Curator in Residence, Bhavisha Panchia. Running from 27 September 2019 through 10 January 2020, ’32: The Rescore features works in a range of media, including vinyl records, sound works, video and multimedia installation.
Taking the First Congress of Arab Music, held in Cairo in 1932, as both anchor and point of departure, the exhibition shows how music is an agent of cultural and political force and attends to the dis(continuities) of identity, history and culture embedded in musical phenomena. Instruments, notation, scale and composition are taken as sites of enquiry, addressing ideological and epistemological schisms between differing world views through musical traditions, registers and practices. Of importance are the ways in which these phenomena and tensions speak to contemporary cultural negotiations, raising questions of technological adoption and cultural adaptation.
Following an international open call, the Air Arabia Curator in Residence Programme offers selected curators the opportunity to undertake a residency in Sharjah and organise an exhibition to be presented at Sharjah Art Foundation. During the residency, the curators conduct research and receive support for travel to destinations within Air Arabia’s flight network, which operates from Sharjah to 70 cities around the world, to further their research.
This exhibition is part of Sharjah Art Foundation’s autumn season. Also opening this month are the exhibitions Lasting Impressions: Adam Henein and Akram Zaatari: Against Photography. An Annotated History of the Arab Image Foundation. The three September shows will be followed by the openings of the exhibitions Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian: Sunset, Sunrise, Bani Abidi: Funland and the March Project 2019 Exhibition (12 October); Marwan Rechmaoui: Slanted Squares (2 November); and Sharjapan2 (20 December). This season will also see the second editions of the annual art book fair FOCAL POINT and the annual film festival Sharjah Film Platform (SFP).