They Did Not Know We Were Seeds

“I have never seen things as clearly as I do now. I won’t follow you to the land where there is greenery, water and lovely faces. No, I will stay here, I won’t ever leave this land called Gaza”  

Ghassan Kanafani, Palestinian author, 1958

Something is there, important to me: a small political form testing itself against an immense expanse of water, sky or trees oscillating between “me” and “them”; between what I can see and the unapproachable other—the nameless, the unknown, the destruction of a habitat, Gaza—whose very existence seems designed to be forgotten. A tremor we no longer dare face head-on; and if we do perceive the invisible and what is being hidden from us, how should we look at it?

These works are like a form of catharsis, and yet they can never truly bear witness to the unimaginable. They exist to defend life, human and nature. These are images that do not necessarily represent an object in the first place; they are, above all, a mental landscape. They are my way of visually expressing my emotions, giving form to my thoughts, and finding a language.

A story of the moment that is part of the flow of history, not only that of the present; it is memory and future, an inextricable flow. From an early age, the idea that history can turn backward, that hopes and progress can be wiped out, have often haunted me.

In the midst of this, the act of creating remains like a garden, with water, light, air and skies, and sometimes it all feels natural. Making and unmaking, transforming the sources, adding, removing.  

An evocation that opens like words from a poem.

Art is a vast expanse set against a world where order, control, and repression are increasingly prevalent. These images are my way of encountering, of prioritizing the sensory, and of exploring the fragile bonds that unite us on and with this planet.

My desire to step aside in favor of these images, to let you find your own way through them, the various strands—images that resist, in various ways, any immediate interpretation, with or without words; yet the relationship is never coincidental, it is a way of engaging. Ultimately, it is up to you to choose your own path.

“I always thought if I photographed anyone or anything enough, I would never lose the person. I would never lose the memory; I would never lose the place. But the picture shows me how much I have lost.”

Nan Goldin, photographer

Part of the proceeds from the sales will go to The Palestine Humanitarian Response Center (PHRC),

A non-profit organization dedicated to protecting and supporting Palestinian children. Registered in the Netherlands, the PHRC brings trauma relief activities and mental health support to children affected by Israel’s genocide – in Gaza, Palestine, and in Cairo, Egypt.