The Sharjah Art Foundation (SAF) is holding the 12th edition of Vantage Point Sharjah (VPS), a yearly exhibition spotlighting emerging photographers from the region and beyond. This year’s theme, If I Were Another, draws its title from a poem by Palestinian poet and author Mahmoud Darwish. The show displays works by four artists selected through an international open call: Sara Kontar, Thasil Suhara Backer, Arum Dayu, and Mosfiqur Rahman Johan. Curated by Sara Al Mheiri (Assistant Curator at SAF), VPS 12 is on view at Bait Obaid Al Shamsi, Arts Square until 8 December 2024.
The featured works explore themes of personal experiences, history, and collective memory. Created using diverse photo techniques, the images evoke fragmented memories that resonate with shared human emotions.
The show celebrates the diversity of voices and lived experiences, demonstrating the innovative spirit of contemporary photography. It offers a dynamic platform for different approaches and formats: from documentary to experimental and from analogue to digital, respectively.
About the artists
Sara Kontar (b. 1996, Syria) is an award-winning artist, photographer, and filmmaker, who has been living in France since 2016. A graduate of the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs de Paris (ENSAD), she has a Master’s degree in Animation Cinema and is an alumna of the Magnum Foundation and VII Foundation. In 2021, Kontar founded the EyesFromSyria platform for photographers in Syria and those in the diaspora, organising exhibitions and screenings.
In 2015, Kontar had to leave her home country because of war, which influenced her practice. Employing documentary and artistic photography, she documents her experiences of exile to explore pieces of forgotten memories and delve into themes of displacement. Among Kontar’s notable projects is Towards a Light (2021-22), a series of photographs printed in cyanotype that documents her journey from Syria to Turkey and then France in 2015. This series expresses the melancholy of exile and the sources of a founding experience. Another project, Paper Homes (2023–ongoing), is based on interviews with individuals in exile. In 2023, the artist shot a black-and-white documentary titled 3350 KM narrating her separation from her father in Syria.
Thasil Suhara Backer (b. 1992, Kerala, India), a multidisciplinary artist, holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Calicut (Kerala) and a Master’s degree in Performing Arts from the University of Hyderabad (India). He also studied at the Intercultural Theatre Institute in Singapore.
Backer’s practice, which deploys performance, photography, video, sculpture, drawing, and text, explores biopolitics and ecology. His work often highlights the poetics of everyday life, intertwining themes of cultural heritage, memory, decay, and renewal. Other themes the artist focuses on include geography, identity, materiality, and the relationship between human and non-human ecological realms.
Artist and musician Arum Dayu (b. 1984, Central Java, Indonesia) earned a Bachelor’s degree (2007) in Communications from Sebelas Maret University, a Diploma in Photojournalism (2012) from Ateneo de Manila University, and a Master’s degree in Visual Art (2020) from Bandung Institute of Technology. She founded Kami Punya Cerita (We Have Our Own Story), a photography study group in Bandung (Indonesia). Dayu is also a member of the bands Tetangga Pak Gesang and Syarikat Idola Remaja.
Through the lens of photojournalism, Dayu’s work examines modern Javanese culture and society, focusing on themes of feminism and motherhood. The subjects of her interest include dangdut, a popular Indonesian folk music genre, and its cultural impact on society.
Mosfiqur Rahman Johan (b. 1997, Bangladesh) is an anthropologist and documentary photographer committed to capturing humanitarian issues, environmental challenges, and socio-political events. He has extensively travelled across Bangladesh to highlight underrepresented stories and social concerns.
Johan studied anthropology at Brac University in Dhaka (Bangladesh), where he honed his skills in ethnography and research-based documentary photography. His work combines visual storytelling with a deep understanding of the cultures and societies he documents, offering nuanced insights into complex issues.
To get more information about Vantage Point Sharjah 12, please go to the official web page of the exhibition.
In addition, you might be interested in visiting Artist’s Rooms: Augustine Paredes and Artist’s Rooms: Sancintya Mohini Simpson.
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