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Occupied Palestinian Territories, West Bank, August 2013. After grueling traffic at the Qalandia checkpoint, a young man enjoys a cigarette in his car as traffic finally clears on the last evening of Ramadan. A sheep, this year's sacrificial lamb for Eid, fills the entire passenger seat. Tanya Habjouqa/NOOR from the series «Occupied Pleasures» 2013.

Tanya Habjouqa: Birds Unaccustomed to Gravity + Picture of the Year: Exhibition & Seminar

 
Award-winning photographer, filmmaker and anthropologist Tanja Habjouqa (Jordan/US) opens Fotografihuset’s 2024 programme with a joint exhibition and seminar organised in collaboration with Preus Museum and OsloMet, based on her ongoing work from Palestine; Birds Unaccustomed to Gravity.
 
Alongside Habjouqa’s outdoor exhibition, the Project Space will screen all winning entries to Årets Bilde 2023 (Picture of the Year); the Press Photographers’ Club’s annual prize for the best in Norwegian photo and video journalism.  
 
Having spent 13 years in East Jerusalem with a husband and two Palestinian children, Tanya Habjouqa’s photographic eye has much in common with the Palestinian proverb “A distress makes you laugh, and a distress makes you cry,”  which was recited in her book “Occupied Pleasures”, which TIME Magazine mentioned as one of the best photo books in 2015.
 
With her unique perspective, she has mapped the physical and psychological boundaries that have defined Palestinian life during the occupation and up until the watershed on October 7. last year, when Gaza was hermetically closed to outside journalists. Habjouqa’s first solo exhibition in Norway, which is titled “Birds Unaccustomed to Gravity”, also includes photos taken on the West Bank in late November 2023 and includes excerpts from both “Occupied Pleasures” and the ongoing series “Birds Unaccustomed to Gravity”.  Both series trace the losses and victories that define Palestinian life; shattering confrontations, microscopic liberations, and the forging, holding, and remembering of space. She explores the tensions within and around landscapes and characters etched into the lives of the land’s occupied and occupying populations.
 

In connection with the opening weekend, Fotografihuset – in collaboration with Preus museum and OsloMet – organise the seminar “Images from Gaza: The Politics of Representation”.

In addition to contributions from Tanya Habjouqa and philosopher Arne Johan Vetlesen, there will be a dialogue between these two and, among others, political scientist Sylo Taraku; head of the research group MEKK (Media in War and Conflict) at OsloMet Kristin Skare Orgeret; social anthropologist, researcher, journalist, editor and author Anne Hege Simonsen; head of the Palestine Committee Line Khateeb and photo editor in the paper VG Espen Rasmussen.

March 13 – SEMINAR in collaboration with Preus Museum and OsloMet: «Images from Gaza: The Politics of Representation»,  17–19.30 in OsloMet’s auditorium Athene 1, Pilestredet 46, Clara Holst hus. Free entry.
 
EXHIBITION OPENING in collaboration with Preus Museum: Birds Unaccustomed to Gravity & Årets Bilde, 16 March, at 15.00 at Fotografihuset at Sukkerbiten.
 
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Born in Jordan and raised between Texas and the Middle East, award-winning journalist, artist, filmmaker and anthropologist Tanya Habjouqa (b. 1975) has become a leading advocate for innovation in photojournalism and documentary practice. With a mordant sense of irony fused with unstinting, forensic interrogations of the implications of geopolitical conflict on human lives, Habjouqa weaves narratives infused with folklore and dark humor. Trained in anthropology and journalism, with an MA in Global Media and emphasis on Middle Eastern politics, her work focuses on identity politics, occupation, dispossession, human rights and subcultures of the Levant.
 
She is the co-founder of Rawiya, the first female photography collective from the Middle East, and is a mentor in the Arab Documentary Program, providing marginalized narratives and narrative-creators with the space and skills to tell their stories. Her work is in the collections of the MFA Boston, the Institut du Monde Arab, and the Carnegie Museum of Art. She is a Nikon Europe Ambassador and advisor and teacher for the NOOR Foundation and the Nikon NOOR academy. Habjouqa is represented by the East Wing Gallery.
Jonas Bendiksen, Russland, 2015. From the project The Last Testament. © Jonas Bendiksen/Magnum Photos.

Jonas Bendiksen and Andrea Gjestvang

Conversations about photography #1.

The series “Conversations about photography” is a central part of Fotografihuset’s pilot program in 2020 and 2021. These conversations will form the basis for a discussion about what Fotografihuset in Oslo could and should be. The series is divided into two: “Photographer conversations” and “Positions in Nordic photography”. The first represents the photographers’ own voices, the last consists of contributions from teachers, curators and critics in the field.

The first photography interview is a meeting between Jonas Bendiksen and Andrea Gjestvang, two of Norway’s foremost documentary photographers. They will present their artistry and the potential of documentary photography today, in print, in digital media and as an exhibition object.

Andrea Gjestvang, Syv søstre, Irbid, Jordan, 2015. From the project Return.

Jonas Bendiksen (b. 1977) is a Norwegian photographer. He began his career when he was 20, when he moved to Russia. In the early years, he traveled all over the former Soviet Union and worked on the book project Satellites, which was published by the Aperture Foundation in 2006. His latest major project, The Last Testament, explores the story of seven men who all claim to be the returned Jesus Christ. Bendiksen has received many awards, including Telenor’s culture prize, the Infinity prize from the International Center of Photography, and the Photography prize. In 2004, he was accepted into the prestigious photo agency Magnum Photos.

Andrea Gjestvang (b. 1981) is a trained photojournalist at Oslo University College (now Oslomet). She has worked for a number of Norwegian and international magazines such as Time Magazine, SZ Magazin and Newsweek. In 2013 she won Image of the Year and the prestigious L’Iris d’Or/Sony World Photography Awards “Photographer of the Year”. She has a number of exhibitions behind her. Gjestvang’s project was presented in Norwegian Journal of Photography #1 (2013).

The event is free, but the number of places is limited. We therefore recommend advance registration. Any available spaces are available on site.

Fotografihuset follows the authorities’ advice and orders in connection with the ongoing corona pandemic. We ask the public to keep a meter distance and stay at home if they are sick.

The conversation will be streamed live on Instagram. Here you can also find previous conversations.

Time: Thursday the 17th of September 2020 18.

The events take place in our temporary exhibition pavilion, and we encourage guests to dress warmly now towards the end of summer.

Registration is closed.

Contact

Visiting address:
Sukkerbiten, Nylandsveien 28, 0150 Oslo

Postal address:
Postboks 3303 Sørenga, 0140 Oslo

E-mail:post@fotografihuset.no

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