The UNRWA Series, 2011

The UNRWA Series, 2011

"These drawings are a series of maps from five different Palestinian refugee camps inside Lebanese territories. In 2005, a friend of mine conducted a workshop on camp mapping, and showed me the drawings by the camps' inhabitants from all ages and genders mapping out their living environment. I was fascinated by the detailed realities and the sense of humor in them. In many urban areas, these tenements whether they are camps, favelas, or ghettos, are usually perceived as black holes within the city fabric that other urban dwellers try to avoid - possibly because the unknown or uncharted spaces symbolize our greatest fears.

In 2011, I received permission to use these drawings in a series of works and bean to recreate and enlarge them. Conveying the everyday life of the camps, I used materials like wooden boards, tin sheets, mounted burlap, and concrete slabs. The outcome was a series of around thirty "drawings/paintings" resembling the original smaller ones, retaining the character of the people who drew them and the places they live."