Jumana Emil Abboud
Jumana Emil Abboud (Arabic: جمانة إميل عبّود) is a Palestinian artist living and working in Jerusalem.[1][2]
Jumana Emil Abboud’s practice weaves together folklore, folktales, water lore, and the entangled legacies of human and more-than-human worlds, activating the survival of stories and landscapes in the wake of dispossession. Over two decades, she has worked across spoken word, drawing, video, walking, journaling - with more recent years extending into collaborative Water Diviners workshops - forms through which storytelling and collective reimagining unfold.
Her work has been included in several exhibitions and biennials, including the Aomori Contemporary Art Center (2024), the 8th Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art (2023), the 23rd Biennale of Sydney (2022), documenta 15 (2022), the Jerusalem Show (2009, 2018), the Venice Biennale (2009, 2015), and the Sharjah Biennial (2005, 2011). She has had solo exhibitions at Cample Line (2023), TAVROS (2022), Darat al Funun - The Khalid Shoman Foundation (2017), Bildmuseet (2017), and BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art (2016).
Recognitions include the Jameel Fellowship at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, in collaboration with the International Glass and Visual Arts Research Centre (Cirva), Marseille (2024-2025) as well as being shortlisted for the Joan Miró Prize (2025) and Artes Mundi 11 Prize (2025-2026).
Abboud was awarded the AFAC GRANT and the Pernod Ricard Fellowship, in addition to the Sharjah Art Foundation production grant.[3] Her work has been included in exhibitions at Documenta 15 (2022), the Sydney Biennial, Venice Biennale, Sharjah Biennal, and the Istanbul Biennial. the Bahrain National Museum in Manama, the Arab World Institute in Paris, The Jerusalem Show, the Darat al Funun in Amman, at the Carré d'Art in Nîmes.[1] at the Gallery for Contemporary Arts in Leipzig and at the Museo Fundacion Antonio Perez in Cuenca.[4]
Life
[edit]Jumana Emil Abboud was born in 1971, in Nazareth
Work
[edit]Abboud uses a combination of drawing, video, installation, performance, text and sculpture[5] to portray themes of memory, loss, belonging, and longing. Abboud draws on her own background and Palestinian culture and traditions in her installations. She explores memory, storytelling and oral history through the body and her use of Palestinian folklore and fairy tales, frequently featuring the Palestinian landscape.[6]
Abboud revisits folk tales and water sources in her work.
Hide Your Water from the Sun as well as Maskouneh (Inhabited) are video works she began researching since 2009, working in collaboration with photographer Issa Freij. These works work with the 1920 study performed by Dr. Tawfiq Canaan about water demons and "haunted" sites such as springs.[7] The essay "Hide Your Water from the Sun: A Performance for Spirited Waters" was written as part of a performance by Abboud at the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center in 2016. With the help of photographer Issa Freij, the artist identified spirited water spots in the topography of Palestine, based on her childhood memories and a 1922 study on Haunted Springs and Water Demons in Palestine.[8]
Abboud worked with Issa Freij, a Palestinian filmmaker, to document the sites. The installation features video of the sites featured in the 1920 study that once contained springs and other water features that have since been lost, but whose locations are a part of Palestinian folklore.[9]
“The inspiration for my work derives mainly from my experiences as a Palestinian; and as an impact of displacement, interest in heritage, in folklore, in storytelling and in community-based long-term research.
Exhibitions
[edit]Solo Exhibitions
- Cample Line, Cample (2023), Tavros, Athens (2022), Darat al-Funun, Amman, Jordan, and Umea University museum 2017), Jumana Emil Abboud, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (May–October 2016) [10]
Group Exhibitions[4]
- ‘Palestin(a) - Eight Woman Artists’, Al Wasiti Art Center, Jerusalem. (1998–1999)
- Mediterranean Biennial for Young Artists, Rome. (1999)
- 'Gateway’, National Gallery of Fine Arts, Amman. (1999)
- ‘Palestinian Artists Today’, Drammens Museum, Norway. (1999)
- Murals in the city, Jericho Winter Festival, Jericho. (1999)
- ‘Look Mama Look’, Art Focus, Jerusalem. (1999)
- The Last Drawing of the Century’, Zerynthia Center for Contemporary Art, Rome. (2000)
- 'Empathy’, Galerie im Kornerpark, Berlin. (2000)
- La Havana International Biennial, Havana. (2000)
- 'DisOrientation’, House of World Culture, Berlin. (2003)
- 'Unscene’, Stephen Lawrence Gallery, London. (2004)
- 'Shame’, Holon Center for Digital Art, Holon. (2004)
- 'Belonging’, The Seventh International Sharjah Biennial, U.A.E. (2005)
- 'Streams of Story’, Tramway, Glasgow International, Glasgow. (2006)
- 'Liminal Spaces’, Gallery for Contemporary Arts, Leipzig. (2006)
- 'Re-Considering Palestinian Art', The Antonio Pérez Foundation, Cuenca, Spain. (2006)
- 'Blindes Vertrauen', Galerie Nord | Kunstverein Tiergarten, Berlin. (2010)
- Sharjah Biennial, Sharjah (2017)[11]
- 'The Unbearable Halfness of Being', documenta fifteen, Grimmwelt Kassel, Kassel. (2022).[12]
References
[edit]- ^ a b "Jumana Emil Abboud". Delfina Foundation. Retrieved 5 April 2024.
- ^ "Jumana Emil Abboud: The Diver". Nafas. May 2009.
- ^ "Profile". Celeste Prize. Retrieved 12 March 2024.
- ^ a b "Jumana Emil Abboud profile". UNESCO. Retrieved 12 March 2024.
- ^ "Practices of Performance Art: Jumana Emil Abboud". Ibraaz. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
- ^ "Jumana Emil Abboud". documenta fifteen. Retrieved 2 April 2024.
- ^ "Tawfik Canaan: His Life and Works | The Institute for Palestine Studies". palestine-studies.org. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
- ^ Abboud, Jumana Emil (2023), "Hide Your Water from the Sun: A Performance for Spirited Waters", War-torn Ecologies, An-Archic Fragments: Reflections from the Middle East, Berlin: ICI Berlin Press, pp. 121–138, doi:10.37050/ci-27/abboud_hide-your-water.html, retrieved 20 May 2024
- ^ "Hide Your Water from the Sun - Jumana Emil Abboud and Isa Freij in conversation". wherevent.com. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
- ^ "Baltic Archive". archive.baltic.art. Retrieved 20 May 2024.
- ^ "people - Sharjah Art Foundation". sharjahart.org. Archived from the original on 20 May 2024. Retrieved 20 May 2024.
- ^ "Jumana Emil Abboud. documenta fifteen, 2022". universes.art. Retrieved 20 May 2024.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Artists | |
| Other | |
- Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design alumni
- Living people
- OCAD University alumni
- Palestinian contemporary artists
- Palestinian emigrants to Canada
- 20th-century Palestinian women artists
- 20th-century Palestinian artists
- 20th-century births
- 21st-century Palestinian women artists
- 21st-century Palestinian artists
- Palestinian video artists
- Women video artists
- Performance artists