“Phantom Home”, by Ahlam Shibli

Commissioned by Carles Guerra, Marta Gili and João Fernandes, Phantom Home is a retrospective of the work of photographer Ahlam Shibli (Palestine, 1970). Employing a documentary aesthetic, the groups of photographs address the contradictory implications behind the notions of home, loss, death, repression and resistance.
 

The exhibition combines nine of the photographic series produced by Shibli over the past decade. In “Eastern LGBT” (2004/2006) and “Dom Dziecka. The house starves when you are away” (2008), images of the body, our first home, also serve to represent the primary objective of repressive policies and the first embodiment of resistance.
 

“Trackers” (2005) and “Trauma” (2008-2009) combine a series of images that portray a colonial conflict which is not limited to the Palestinian territories.
 

“Goter” (2002-2003), “Arab al-Sbaih” (2007) and “The Valley” (2007-2008) employ topographical perspectives to condemn the process of dispossession of lands suffered by the Palestinians and, finally, “Death” (2011-2012), conceived especially for this retrospective, portrays the attempts made by Palestinian society to preserve the presence of those who have lost their lives as a result of the occupation.