he new Dubai show of Ramallah-based artist Bashar Alhroub looks at his native city Jerusalem as a place with multiple identities. “When you are in Jerusalem,” Alhroub told me, “you never feel you are in one single place. You never feel that the city is belonging to anyone, although everyone claims it as theirs.”
The artist’s new show opened on 14 November at Zawyeh Gallery in Dubai, and last until 5 January. Called “Tracing Boundaries”, the artist focuses on Jerusalem as a religious symbol, while also looking at it as a subject of pop culture. He traces the boundaries between holiness and material culture and invites the visitor to observe a fine line between spirituality and commercial clutter.
“Jerusalem as a city has a lot of layers, whether historical, religious or mythological,” Alhroub explained. “Everyone tries to create a new history around it, and with this show I did it too, according to the relationship I have built with the city over time. I materialised it through objects from reality, as well as from what I imagine when I walk around the city. Ultimately, it’s an inner Jerusalem I’m talking about.”
A sense of place is perhaps the only constant in Alhroub’s large and varied artistic production. Across different mediums, his work constantly evokes a feeling of attachment, a sense of significant ownership of that place, which he expresses through photography, painting and installation works.