Talk "Arab Image Foundation, a chronic redefinition"
In her talk Yasmine Eid-Sabbagh will discuss the Arab Image Foundation (AIF/www.fai.org.lb) founded in Beirut, Lebanon in 1997. The foundation is an institution dedicated to the preservation of photography and the Arab imaginary.
The AIF’s expanding collection is generated through artist and scholar-led projects. The ongoing research and acquisition of photographs include so far Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, Iraq, Iran, Mexico, Argentina and Senegal. To date, the collection holds more than 600,000 photographs.
She will try to expose the artistic, institutional, cultural and economical dimensions of the AIF, which until today constantly re-defines itself through an auto-critical institutional practice.
The Foundation makes its collection accessible to the public through a wide spectrum of activities, including exhibitions, publications, videos, a website and an online image database.
Yasmine Eid-Sabbagh studied history, photography and visual anthropology in Paris. From 2006 to 2011 he lived in Burj al-Shamali, a refugee camp near Tyr, Lebanon, where he developed a photographic research, including a dialogic project with young Palestinian refugees and archival work of family and studio photographs. Since 2008, Eid-Sabbagh is a member of the Arab Image Foundation. She currently develops a doctorate at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna.