Dammam

Dammam
Performance/Installation, Performance/Installation, 2.5m x 3.5m
Dammam draws on Dammam Zani, the ritual drumming and cymbal ceremonies of southern Iran associated with mourning, collective memory and resistance. Traditional drums are replaced with oil barrels painted with the names of major oil companies, linking ritual form to histories of extraction and colonialism. Performed with refugees from Iran and Iraqi Kurdistan, the work also reflects on displacement and political conditions tied to migration. Detail view focusing on the installation formed through the performance, as leaking oil gradually stains the Persian carpet and transforms ritual action into material residue. For me, the carpet is not simply an object but a carrier of cultural memory, labour and economic history; marked by oil, it becomes a metaphor for extraction and damage. As performers leave the space one by one through this aftermath, the work gestures toward displacement and the political forces bound up with migration.

Detail view focusing on the aftermath of the performance as installation, where footprints and the ruined carpet remain as traces of action and residue. These marks become a record of rupture and passage, reflecting conditions of displacement and the political realities the work invokes through what is left behind.

 2022 , Blenheim Walk Gallery