Artist: Tarek Al-Ghoussein
Date: 2013
Size: 60 x 90 cm
Museum: Contemporary Art Platform (Kuwait City, Kuwait)
Technique: Photography
Looking into images from K-Files, one is struck with a deep sense of loss and longing; the figure in each photo seems to be the only person left in the world.Al-Ghoussein has said of his work, “It is not about me, it is about a figure or a person, an actor in a scene and it explores the identity of the land and how we define ourselves through the landscape.” Al-Ghoussein’s photos are very much like film stills, each one beckoning a narrative; and considering the comparison of the figure in his photos to “actors in a scene” brings to mind movies like El Topo and Paris, Texas, featuring self-reflective characters roving through desolate deserts. In the former, the protagonist is on a quest, and in the latter he is lost in grief. In Al-Ghoussein’s image, the figure also seems lost, disconnected from a sense of home or belonging, always alone, and utterly dwarfed by the vastness of a structure or landscape, such as the image showing him sitting inside the ruins of a chandeliered hall or standing before a cluster of residential towers. In a way, this figure is also a watcher, a silent observer of his surroundings. Though the environments fill the picture plane, it is impossible to ignore the lone figure in each one.
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