![The "South West Bank" show at Palazzo Mora [Naima Morelli]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/IMG_3287.jpg?fit=1067%2C800&ssl=1)
My first report from Venice. Besides the controversy around the closed Israeli Pavilion, in this article for Middle East Monitor I look at three shows representing different facets of Palestine at the 2024 Venice Biennale
Here is the link to the article
Read More![Malaysian-Palestinian artist Mandy El-Sayegh .[Photo Abtin Eshraghi. Courtesy of the artist and Lawrie Shabibi]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Portrait-of-Mandy-El-Sayegh-in-her-studio.-Photo-Abtin-Eshraghi.-Courtesy-of-the-artist-and-Lawrie-Shabibi-1536x1025-1.jpg?fit=1199%2C800&ssl=1)
Middle East Monitor has just published my latest interview with Malaysian-Palestinian artist Mandy El-Sayegh.
Based on assemblage and cultural hybridity, the artist’s work uses artifacts from contemporary culture to speak of the current political climate.
Here is the link to the interview
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As Hong Kong is gearing up for its art week, I have spoken with collectors and gallerists for the Financial Times to see how the art market is a bit more fragmented than it used to be.
Here is the link to the article
In my interview with curator Nadine Khalil for The Markaz Review, we discover the artists on display in Dubai in the exhibition, I Can No Longer Produce the Limits of My Own Body, on view at the Nika Gallery through the 24th of February, 2024.
Here is the link to the article
Read More![Faisal Saleh, founder of Palestinian Museum, speaks during the inauguration of the facility in Woodbridge, Connecticut, April 22, 2018. [HECTOR RETAMAL/AFP via Getty Images]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/GettyImages-950084052.jpg?fit=1200%2C799&ssl=1)
“A few months ago, the director of the Palestine Museum US, Faisal Saleh, was in a room in Venice with members of the commission for the 2024 Venice Art Biennale. They tried to explain to him why his proposal for a collateral exhibition of Palestinian artists was rejected.
Saleh is not only Palestinian, but also very American in his ethos. So, he told me, when the Biennale spokesperson tried to convince him that art and politics have to be kept separate, he didn’t hesitate to tell them, ‘Well, I may not be as much of an expert on art as you are, but I do know that politics and art are intertwined. You can’t really separate one from the other.’ “
Faisal Saleh, director of the Palestine Museum US has started a petition to have a Palestinian-only collateral show at the Venice Biennale 2024. I spoke with him for Middle East Monitor.
Here is the link to the interview
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“I see the beauty in many places, many times, and I have always wanted to interrupt conversations to point out what I see,” says Palestinian artist Samia Halaby. “I learned not to do so, and share beauty through painting.”
Today in her eighties, Samia Halaby is a pioneer of abstract painting and a central figure in Palestinian art, with an artistic career that started in the late 1950s and was also accompanied by a strong commitment to the liberation of her country.
I have interviewed the artist for The New Arab.
Here is the link to the interview
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My latest piece for The Financial Times. I have interviewed the Taiwanese artist Su-Hui Yui about his work on collective memories, transgression and technological change in Asian societies that he presented during the Singapore Art Week.
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The Italian Magazine Arabpop has just published my interview with Libyan artist Marwa Benhalim in Italian, with the title “The history of the world in a fist of couscous.”
This issue magazine themed “feast” is now out in the press.
The Markaz Review has published my latest article called “My Love for Derna: Interview with Libyan Writer Mahbuba Khalifa”
Mahbuba Khalifa, a Libyan philosophy graduate, is an author and poet from flood-devastated Derna, often called Libya’s “city of poets.” She has devoted her most recent book to the city of her childhood and adolescence.
Here is the link to the interview
I have a new piece out on the weekend edition of the Financial Times, called “Central Asia in the spotlight at Asia Now fair.”
The article looks at how craft, nomadism and spirituality feature prominently in the region’s artistic practices, and are the focus on the art fair Asia Now, happening next week in Paris.
I wrote a piece for The Markaz Review, wondering whether curators who organize international exhibitions and develop books aren’t in fact public intellectuals. With interviews to @roseissaprojects @punkorientalism @farah.abushullaih
“Contrary to popular belief, it remains true that the specter of the intellectual still haunts the art world. The only thing that has changed is the mask they now hide behind — that of ‘curator.’ The current dislike of the word intellectual runs just as deep as our love for the word “curator.” ‘
My latest story: “Contemporary Libyan art is looking back at its recent and ancient history”, has just been published on the beautiful Hadara Magazine.
I spoke with curator Najlaa Elageli, artists Tewa Barnosa, Shefa Salem and many others.
Naima Morelli is an arts writer and journalist specialized in contemporary art from Asia-Pacific and the MENA region.
She has written for the Financial Times, Al-Jazeera, The Art Newspaper, ArtAsiaPacific, Internazionale and Il Manifesto, among others, and she is a regular contributor to Plural Art Mag, Middle East Monitor and Middle East Eye as well as writing curatorial texts for galleries.
She is the author of three books on Southeast Asian contemporary art.
Reach out: contact [at] naimamorelli.com
