‘Multi Exposure 2000 Exile’ – The British-Israeli-Palestinian Awards

The original Award scheme, ‘Double Exposure’, was set up in 1993 by photographer Sandra Jacobs to promote the cultural exchange between Britain and Israel. During the first five years, the awards were given to British and Israeli photographers and artists enabling them to spend a month in each other’s country, explore themes of interest, acquaint themselves with a foreign lifestyle and culture to provide a personal project. This year the scheme has been broadened to become tripartite, involving British, Israeli and Palestinian artists, under the new title ‘Multi Exposure’

Julia Guest a graduate form Goldsmiths College, London is a press photographer exploring current socio-political tensions in the form of a photo essay. During her visit to Israel, Guest has tried to document how Bedouin society copes with fundamental changes in lifestyle, and the ways in which Israeli and Palestinian societies respond to these processes.

Rula Halawani is a Palestine press photographer and artist. For the project, she has documented the lives of expatriate families not just from the Occupied territories but also in India, China and various Arab countries, focusing on the experience of immigration and exile.

Gordon Hon (Britain) has worked with film and video. In his current work ‘Fantastic Ruins’ he follows the interwoven process of construction and desertion of the settlements and new housing projects in Israel and the Occupied Territories.

Chen Shish is the daughter of immigrants from Tunisia who settled in the northern Israeli city of Safed. During her stay in London, Chen has reconnected to her Tunisian roots to create a body of work which combines the ‘found’ and the manufactured, East and West, the private and public self.

Louise Short is a Bristol based artist whose work is comprised mainly of processes of collection and classification of materials, alongside still photographs and super 8 film. She travelled to Israel to come to terms with, and to relate to, the life and works of Meir Agassi, an Israeli artist and writer who lived in Bristol. Meir, his wife and son were killed in a tragic accident in 1998.

Subhi Zobaidi chose to explore the different themes of ‘Exile’ through a performance he initiated and produced during his stay in London. The performance featured a recreation of a street where many years ago a Palestinian artist Najil Ali was murdered. Zobaidi chose to use the murder story as an allegory for the condition of exile. His work for the exhibition will consist of still photographs from the performance.

Multi Exposure 2000 travels to Manchester after being shown at the Wigmore Fine Art, London and the Hamumneh Gallery, Tel Aviv. It will then return to the Middle Eastern Palestinian town of Ramalla in Autumn 2000.