Courtesy the artist and Galerie Polaris, Paris

Yto Barrada, "Couronne d'Oxalis," from the series "Iris Tingitana" (2006–2009). Wallpaper, dimensions variable.

March 2009 Field Guide

Ellen Gallagher

Jerzy Grotowski

Nina Könnemann

Do Look Back in Anger

Christian Jankowski

James Coleman

The Collection

William Kentridge: Five Themes

Yto Barrada The Face of Our Time Gallery to Host Cairo’s First Live Auction of Contemporary Art Tangerine Dream

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The photographs of Yto Barrada and Hala Elkoussy examine their respective homelands — Morocco and Egypt — and these nations’ struggles with identity and modern-ization. In Barrada’s series A Life Full of Holes: The Strait Project, for example, she photographed the Strait of Gibraltar region over eight years, depicting the hopeful émigrés yearning for Europe and the marginal landscape they reluctantly inhabit in the meantime. Elkoussy’s photos, meanwhile, sometimes look like reportage but are actually staged moments of everyday life in Cairo. For this exhibition, the artist—who once produced a family photo album featuring a nonexistent Egyptian clan—will present multimedia works as well as organize a new project with local actors in Gothenburg. Running concurrently with the show is a series of contemporary Moroccan films organized by Cinématèque de Tanger, a cultural center cofounded by Barrada. With one of the most lenient asylum policies in Europe, Sweden absorbs tens of thousands of refugees every year from the Middle East, Africa, and the Balkans; the thoughtful work of these two rising artists should prove deeply resonant. konsthallen.goteborg.se

"Yto Barrada and Hala Elkoussy " originally appeared in the March 2009 issue of Modern Painters. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Modern Painters' March 2009 Table of Contents.