Zena Assi: My City Shore

Migrants and refugees news has lately captured the world’s attention with scenes of heartbreaking tragedy. Countries within this turmoil are re-drawing their borders yet again, new walls and fortifications have been erected, landscapes are utterly changing, bridges demolished, areas quarantined; all in the hope of containing these masses on the move.

My City Shore, the latest series of works, is an attempt to put on canvas the landscape of a constantly shifting city shore, where the desperately sought after reality progressively merges with the surreal, loses its shape, and transforms into nothing but a mirage. The notion of a vibrant secure city haven is being exposed only to see what‘s beneath; it is fixed on a canvas only to witness its hollow prefabricated infrastructure.

This body of works formulates an invitation to question how our cityscapes can subsist, materially, socially, as well as culturally, in light of such a colossal humanitarian crisis.