Hazem Harb Palestinian-Italian, b. 1980
41 3/8 x 92 1/2 in
For Hollyland, 2019, Harb layers acrylic lettering spelling out ‘Hollyland’ in Hollywood’s ubiquitous squared lettering over an archival photograph of Bethlehem.
Hollywood’s typography, a visual code that denotes celebrity and projects American culture as a global culture, takes on new meaning through Harb’s reworking.
Exhibitions
Hollyland Part. 2 by visual artist, Hazem Harb continues the artist's examination of the social significance attributed to particular places and spaces - through processes of soft dominance - a visual investigation which has been central to Harb's practice for several decades.Collage is regularly employed by Harb as a mode of synthesising ideas from disparate cultures and times in order to form new meaning. For the first part of this series, in Hollyland, 2019, Harb layered acrylic lettering spelling out ‘Hollyland ’in Hollywood’s ubiquitous squared lettering over an archival photograph of Jerusalem.Hollywood’s typography, a visual code that denotes celebrity and projects American culture as global culture takes on new meaning through Harb’s reworking. The artist ushers into question the value systems that establish certain locations as iconic and normalise these ideas as universal. Harb now applies this concept to other regional sites in three new works: Mar Saba Monastery, Bethlehem, 2021, The Dead Sea, Jericho, 2021 and View From The Foot of Mount Carmel, Haifa, 2021. By foregrounding the natural and historic sites of his region, from the storied 5th century Mar Saba monastery on the outskirts of Bethlehem to the sacred folds of the Mount Carmel mountains, Harb challenges Western hegemony, in the production of culture and knowledge, and proposes that there are other narratives that matter.
Literature
Hollyland Part. 2 by visual artist, Hazem Harb, continues the artist's examination of the social significance attributed to particular places and spaces - through processes of soft dominance - a visual investigation which has been central to Harb's practice for several decades.
Collage is regularly employed by Harb as a mode of synthesising ideas from disparate cultures and times in order to form new meaning. For the first part of this series, Hollyland, 2019, Harb layered acrylic lettering spelling out ‘Hollyland’ in Hollywood’s ubiquitous squared lettering over an archival photograph of Jerusalem. Hollywood’s typography, a visual code that denotes celebrity and projects American culture as global culture, takes on new meaning through Harb’s reworking. The artist ushers into question the value systems that establish certain locations as iconic and normalise these ideas as universal.
Here, Harb applies this concept to other regional sites in three new works: Mar Saba Monastery, Bethlehem, 2021, The Dead Sea, Jericho, 2021 and View From The Foot of Mount Carmel, Haifa, 2021. By foregrounding the natural and historic sites of his region, from the storied 5th century Mar Saba monastery on the outskirts of Bethlehem to the sacred folds of the Mount Carmel mountains, Harb challenges Western hegemony in the production of culture and knowledge, and proposes that there are other narratives that matter.