ReOrientalism

The Center for Cultural Exchange and ALWAN for the Arts presents the New York premiere of ReOrientialism, a multi-media performance created by Alan Shavarsh Bardezbanian, Suheir Hammad, Karim Nagi Mohammed and starring Said’s daughter Najla Said, master dancer Seyyide Sultan, and others. The show was inspired by the late Edward Said’s seminal book Orientalism (1979).

ReOrientalism, created by Armenian composer and oud virtuoso Alan Shavarsh Bardezbanian, Palestinian performance poet Suheir Hammad, and Egyptian designer and percussionist Karim Nagi Mohammed, is a multi-media performance exploring the West’s simultaneous romanization and fear of Islam. The creators, like most Arab-Americans, contend with complex identity issues. “Is it choice – or is it compulsion?” asks Karim Mohammed. “I can be just another anonymous American . . . until I mention my name. Now, I am an Arab. I am obliged to lead a political life.” The nuance of this experience is reflected in the performance texts and music that ranges from rigidly conservative traditional forms to fusions with techno music and hip hop poetics. “We’re trying to create a specifically-Eastern Western voice,” suggests Suheir Hammad, “that is responding to the West’s view of the East.”

ReOrientalism unfolds through both spoken and sung text. Suheir Hammad (libretto) will include her own new work interspersed with fragments drawn from Said’s writings as well as illustrative samplings from works of Oriental literature that have dominated the West’s conception, i.e. 1001 Arabian Nights. The live action will be complemented by several video “conversations” between Suheir Hammad in New York, several different actors, and Edward Said himself, appearing on archival video footage.