Hand-made doll, maftool painted gold, carrots (Maftool is a Palestinian couscous made from wheat)
21 x 11 in
Courtesy of the artist
Jacqueline Reem Salloum is a an artist and filmmaker whose pop-infused work draws on her Palestinian and Syrian roots. Her multimedia artwork focuses on documenting histories and memories of people,...
Jacqueline Reem Salloum is a an artist and filmmaker whose pop-infused work draws on her Palestinian and Syrian roots. Her multimedia artwork focuses on documenting histories and memories of people, including her family, that have been fragmented by displacement and exile.
Salloum’s three works in the exhibit were inspired by interviews with Sumaya Yousef who grew up in the Fawar refugee camp, near Hebron, Palestine. Maftoolayais an ode to the power of children’s imagination and creativity in coping with inhumane situations.
Sumaya spent many of her childhood days playing with friends, making dolls with scraps of found material and pretending to be in a far off golden dreamworld, which in reality was the wheat fields behind her house that shimmered like gold in the sunshine and that her mother would harvest to make Sumaya’s favorite meal, Maftool.
Salloum’s work has been exhibited in solo and group shows in the US and internationally including, Mori Art Museum, Japan; Reina Sofia, Spain; Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei, Taiwan; Institute of Contemporary Arts, London; Palazzo Papesse Centre for Contemporary Art, Sienna, Italy. She directed the award winning feature documentary on the Palestinian Hip Hop scene, Slingshot Hip Hop, which premiered at the Sundance film festival. Salloum’s film work includes experimental video pieces like Planet of the Arabs, which also screened at Sundance.