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Founded by Egyptian filmmaker Hayat Aljowaily, ‘Kalam Aflam’ is spotlighting emerging Arab artists in Paris.
As Egyptian and Arab artists continue to explore new mediums and voices around the world, experimenting with themes rooted in their respective local identities, one Egyptian filmmaker in France found herself yearning for a community, and so she became a host for one. With a belief in the power of the collective, Hayat Aljowaily founded ‘Kalam Aflam’, a space for emerging Arab artists in Paris and beyond.
‘Kalam Aflam’ launched its first event this May at Point Ephemere, Paris, under the theme ‘Coming of Age’, which hosted a series of art installations, short films and musical performances centring around the same theme. “This is a project that I was dying to make happen for three years, and so the theme ‘Coming of Age’ felt very fitting for our first event,” Hayat Aljowaily tells CairoScene. “It – or we – are something that is ‘becoming’.”
Like many Arabs in the diaspora, Aljowaily can sometimes feel like her experience isn’t Western enough or Arab enough. Within the folds of ‘Kalam Aflam’, however, she looks to surround herself with artists who share in her experiences.
“As an Arab artist living abroad, one always feels like they’re in between. But when you’re part of a community of people who look like you or have similar experiences, it changes everything,” Aljowaily says. “It was so refreshing to be in a space where I’m not the only Arab woman, my friends had to look around within a sea of familiar faces to spot me.”
Through an upcoming series of public arts and cultural events, ‘Kalam Aflam’ offers up a space for self-expression and a blossoming creative narrative for those on the lookout for a home. Aljowaily and her partners, Palestinian communications specialist Abood Al Bakri and Lebanese art director Katja Kanaan, continue to open doors for emerging voices, carving out a space for themselves while spotlighting stories waiting to be told.
France has made the Yemeni writer Ali Al-Muqri a knight of the French Order of Arts and Letters.
Al-Muqri recently received a letter from Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin, the French minister of culture, telling him that he was among the honorees chosen as members of the order this year.
Al-Muqri has been living in France at the invitation of the Arab World Institute since 2015, after fleeing the war in his home country. He had lived in Sana’a, the capital, which is now controlled by the Houthi rebel movement. People close to Al-Muqri have warned him he risked being pursued by the Houthis if he returned to Yemen.
The Order of Arts and Letters, one of four “ministerial orders” in France, is awarded to people who have distinguished themselves through artistic or literary creation or by contributing to the influence of arts and letters in France and the world. It has three ranks: commander, officer, and knight (chevalier).
Al-Muqri said in a telephone interview with Al-Fanar Media that he had not been aware of his candidacy for this order and was surprised by the letter.
He believes that his being named for the prestigious French order is “a tribute to Arabic literature, and a reward for writing a literary work that has its own narrative and cultural characteristics.”
He said Arabic literature was marginalized because it was rarely translated and he hoped his award would shed more light on it.
Novels and Prize Nominations
Ali Al-Muqri began his literary career as a cultural editor for several Yemeni publications before beginning to write prose, poetry and novels himself. His works have been translated into French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Persian.
“Black Taste, Black Odour” and “The Handsome Jew” were longlisted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction in 2009 and 2011, and “Hurma”, in its French translation, won an honourable mention from the Arab World Institute Prize for Fiction and the French prize for Arabic literature. “Adani Incense” was shortlisted for the 2015 Sheikh Zayed Book Award.
Between Home and Exile
Despite his years in self-imposed exile in Paris and his freedom to write, “far from the guilt feelings that affected his literary works,” Al-Muqri said he still “experiences the hardships of alienation far from his homeland.”
“I live in double exile, and I miss every detail of my life in Yemen,” he said. “Where is the writing corner in my house in Sana’a, where I used to write my literary works, my books piled around me? I miss my habits and my rituals that were the primary motivator and the inspiration for my writing.”
Al-Muqri said that particular places in Yemen and the way of eating and drinking there gave a feeling of continuity that he misses.
The issues of Yemeni life inspired more than one of his novels, which he attributes to his constant endeavor to “explore the human self and evoke the causes of its anxiety through exposure to the problems facing people, whether they are in freedom of expression or because of discrimination against a person because of his colour, his sexual identity or because he was marginalized by a dictatorial authority.”
Al-Muqri said that he could write more in Yemen than he can in France. The war took him forcefully from his country and made him feel alienated and unable to get hold of the things that inspired and motivated him to write.
But that feeling has not prevented his ability to integrate with French society, he said. Thanks to his personal experience and knowledge of European culture, he has been able to adapt and engage in his new life in the host country.
Yemeni Literature in Wartime
Al-Muqri said most Yemeni writers and authors had lost their jobs because of the war and many of them had resorted to other types of work so they could continue to live.
Most were no longer able to obtain the basic requirements of life, such as electricity, clean water, or a regular salary. Al-Muqri said the absence of these things “makes any writer or author unable to write and think.”
The war has greatly hindered literary life in his country, Al-Muqri said, but it remains active despite the restrictions and censorship imposed by the authorities.
Al-Muqri said he was working on a new novel. He hopes to continue writing “in freedom and safety” and to return to Yemen after the situation stabilizes.
Ali Al-Muqri has lived in France since 2015. He hopes the honour he has won there will draw more attention to Arabic literature in translation. (Photo courtesy of Ali Al-Maqri)
Back in 1729, the Parisian authorities introduced the French capitals iconic blue-and-green street name plaques, topped with a little “Napoleon’s hat” containing the number of the street’s arrondissement.
The plaques honor France and the world’s leading politicians, philosophers, artists, writers, and scientists, including a number associated with the Arab world. French President Emmanuel Macron has previously proposed renaming some of the capital’s streets to include more personalities from ethnic minorities, but that has not yet happened. Still, there are enough Arab names to comprise a walking tour around Paris — including a president, a poet, a pop star and more.
With a wonderful view of the Grand Palais, this large, peaceful stretch of greenery is named after independent Tunisia’s first president, Habib Bourguiba. The secular leader was in charge between 1957 and 1987, and was famously a supporter of women’s rights. Next to his plaque, there is a bronze bust of the leader looking towards the River Seine, with his name written in Arabic underneath.
An admirer of Bourguiba, Halimi was a Tunisian-born French lawyer, feminist, and former member of the National Assembly in France. She died in 2020, aged 93, and this sloping pathway was named after her last year. Halimi’s life of hardships shaped the respected career she had. When she was born, her father hid her — ashamed of her gender. She went on a hunger strike at 10 and, at 16, rejected an arranged marriage, going on to study law in Paris. Halimi is perhaps best known for a 1972 trial, in which she defended a minor who had an abortion after being raped. It was a key event that propelled the country into legalizing abortion in 1975.
Paris mayor Bertrand Delanoe (second from right) and Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas (second from left) unveil on June 14, 2010 in Paris the new Mahmoud Darwich esplanade named after the Palestinian poet who died Aug. 9, 2008. (AFP)
In 2010, just two years after the death of Palestine’s most famous poet Mahmoud Darwish, a square in Paris was inaugurated in his honor. Known for his writings on home, memory, and exile, Darwish spent many years outside of his native land. He lived in Beirut, Cairo, Tunis, and Paris. He had a special connection with the latter, describing it as the place where his “true poetic birth” happened. The plaque is situated in a district the poet reportedly liked, on the banks of the Seine and near the classical buildings of Institut de France and Monnaie de Paris.
A few minutes away from Notre Dame Cathedral stands an unassuming but sobering reminder of how an Arab collective suffered during the turbulent Sixties. In 1961, when Algeria was seeking independence, a group of Algerian protesters were attacked by the police and some of their bodies were thrown into the Seine. In 2021, to mark the 60th anniversary of this horrific event, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo inaugurated a memorial artwork, made of metal with silhouettes of heads carved out, in remembrance of those who lost their lives.
Between 1962 and 1987, the blonde bombshell diva Dalida, who was born to Italian parents in Egypt, lived in this four-story townhouse in hilly Montmartre, a quiet area outside of the bustling city center of the city that is historically associated with artists. Dalida sang in a variety of languages, including French, Italian, and Arabic. “Salma Ya Salama” and “Helwa Ya Baladi” are some of her most loved Arabic songs. Sadly, it was in this house that she committed suicide in 1987, as a result of tragedies in her personal life. The plaque on her house reads: “Her friends from Montmartre will not forget her.”
The acclaimed Lebanese-born poet and philosopher — and author of “The Prophet” — Khalil Gibran is well-known as a member of the Arab diaspora in 20th-century America. But he also lived in France for a time. Between 1908 and 1910, Gibran, who was then in his twenties, studied painting at Académie Julian in Paris. His stay in the city was made possible by the financial backing of American philanthropist, editor and Gibran’s lover Mary Haskell, who was 10 years his senior.
source/content: arabnews.com (headline edited)
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A memorial to remember the 1961 attack on Algerian protesters by the police in Paris. (Supplied)
