EGYPTIAN architectural historian May El-Ibrashy wins Prince Claus Fund’s Impact Award

Egyptian architectural historian May El-Ibrashy is among the winners of the 2022 Prince Claus Impacts awards for her contribution and innovation in her community.

The Prince Claus Fund has announced on Tuesday the six recipients of the first 2022 Prince Claus Impact Awards. 

The new award honours individuals whose work in art and culture engages their communities in innovative, positive ways while addressing issues of urgent contemporary relevance.

El-Ibrashy is an architect whose work centres on community engagement through heritage conservation, rehabilitation, preservation, and re-signification. She is the founder of the Megawra Built Environment Collective, a twinship between an architectural firm and an NGO.

Through her work she has managed to create a real difference for the often-marginalised communities living in Cairo’s historic centre and has created an important counter narrative to the current government’s focus on urban expansion and renewal, creating a new sense of hope and pride for the communities she works with. 

Focusing on Al-Khalifa District in Sayeda Zeinab, Al-Hattaba district by the citadel, and Al-Imam Al-Shafii district, El-Ibrashy’s participatory conservation initiative is an inspiring successful community dialogue that has been going on for 10 years. The impact of the dialogue still resonates in the communities of Al Khalifa District, Al-Hattaba and Al-Imam Al-Shafii.

The other five recipients are: 

Ailton Alves Lacerda Krenak (Brazil), an indigenous leader, environmentalist, and philosopher.

Alain Gomis (Senegal), a Senegalese-French film director and screenwriter.

Hassan Darsi (Morocco), a visual artist whose work promotes critical thinking about public spaces and citizenship.

Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara (Cuba), an artist and human rights defender.

María Medrano (Argentina) is a writer, poet and editor.

The Awards Ceremony shall take place in the Royal Palace Amsterdam on the 7th of December.

source/content: english.ahram.org.eg (headline edited)

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EGYPT

PALESTINIAN documentary ‘Vibrations from Gaza’ wins Best Short at 68th BFI London Film Festival

Palestinian documentary Vibrations from Gaza won the Best Short Film award at the 68th BFI London Film Festival (9 to 20 October 2024).

The 76-minute-long Vibrations from Gaza was among 10 films competing in London’s festival.

While announcing the winning film, the festival’s Short Film Competition jury praised the film saying: “We were astonished by the calibre of films in this competition and struggled to only award one film. Our winner is a film that uses sound to send reverberations through our bodies and souls,” reads the press release.

Vibrations from Gaza offers a glimpse into the lives of deaf children in the besieged and occupied Gaza Strip. Through the voices of children who have grown up under the relentless blockade and repeated Israeli aggression, it vividly conveys how they experience the bombings, destruction, and drone buzz overhead.

The short documentary — which is one of the last documentaries to come out of Gaza before the Israeli war’s eruption last year — features children Amani Iz Eldin, Musa and Mustafa Samour, and Isra Abuasr.

The film previously held its world premiere at the Palestine Cinema Days Film Festival in its home country before screening at numerous festivals and winning several awards, including Best Short at the Iran International Film Festival and the Azur Phoenix Award for Short Films at the Middle East and South Africa Film Festival.

Rehab Nazzal is a one-woman show in this film, serving as its director, producer, and writer.

Nazzal is a Palestinian-born multidisciplinary artist and educator based in Montreal, Canada and Bethlehem, Palestine.

Her work deals with the effects of settler and colonial violence on people, on land, and other non-human life in Palestine.

Nazzal’s photography, videos, sound, and installations have been exhibited and screened in Palestine, Canada, and internationally.

She has created multiple short videos, blurring the boundaries between documentary and video art, including Dima, A Night at Home, Canada Park, Bodies in Motion, Mourning, and Bil’in.

source/content: english.ahram.org.eg (headline edited)

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PALESTINE