ElNemr, Rana (Egypt)

| 2011-10-04 12:33:08

BADGAST artist in residence October 2009
Photographer Rana ElNemr (Egypt)
Project at Badgast: Coastline II: Locating Encounters
Artistic statement
Previous work ' Locating Encounters I'

Rana ElNemr photographer (Egypt) researched and presented 'Coastline II - Locating Encounters”. It consists of a photo & text installation, that constructs a future imaginary coastal zone, as clear or as vague as it may exist in drawings, in photos, in promises, in conversations or in minds.

Coastline II: Locating Encounters
"Within frames of the expected, the planned, and the wished for, the coast’s habitants & frequenters contemplate familiar spaces, facilities & displays, questioning connections, disconnections & reconnections. Between accommodating, known by means of the sea, and a relocating & repositioning contact zone, sea-land communication modes & intensities are altered, engagement possibilities reconstructed, and economic opportunities are shifted.“Locating Encounters” is a photo & text installation, that constructs a future imaginary coastal zone, as clear or as vague as it may exist in drawings, in photos, in promises, in conversations or in minds."

photos: Rana ElNemr

Artistic statement:
' When asked, as an artist, why I specifically use the tool of photography, I say, it is the nature of the photographic medium, its inspiring process, capturing scenes from different dimensions, storing them, cutting them, combining them, assembling and disassembling them, opening up for endless links and relationships… with the aim of making sense out of my everyday surroundings, highlighting parts I see could be triggers for a thought or line. The complexity of the city’s structure, its organic growth, its intermingled unsynchronized streams, I am talking about my hometown Cairo, clearly identify the intention behind my work.
Observing an everyday urban reality that is overwhelming in information, whereas most of this information comes from 5th -hand, 10th-hand, 30th  & 200th – hand sources, or is channeled in via political, economic or other strategies… this has created an urge for transparency, accessibility and a level of consistency, it has created a need for documentation.
That need has become an interest of mine, and an approach in itself.
In my spacial surroundings, I see long streams, which are strong, dark, quiet and slow. I find them incomprehensible, intolerant or reckless and a little bit scary. And I see other streams, short ones, often fleeting, but many many of them. They seem shy but very adaptable…  These, carry sound, color and warmth.  In my artwork, I attempt to look at these shorter streams.'

Previous works
'Locating Encounters I'