Facing the Wall.

Several visits, namely field work trips, were taken by Wolf and Shalem between the years 2006 and 2009. These trips were aim at defining the specific scale that this project might take and is particular focus and also spotting the ideal areas for the photographic campaigns. Circa 900-1000 pictures focus and also spotting the ideal areas for the photographer, Dror Maayan, whose tusk was to document all graffiti paintings on both sides of the wall.

The images were taken in September 2007, and in December 2007. They document the areas of Jerusalem, Beth Lehem, Ramallah and several other chechpoints and passages, mainly around the area of Jerusalem (we were also aware of other areas of the segregation wall in Isreal-Palestine, especially in the districts of Nataniya and Jenin, but realized that the situation there is different: the security zones on both sides of the wall provide almost no access to the wall and thus artists cannot paint on it in these areas). The visual documentation includes painting. graffiti, inscriptions and photography (i.e. photographic posters which were also put on the wall).

"The Facing the Wall" book aims at displaying the wall as an object of artistic desire. A space of artistic interactions and a canvas on which artists, be it local Palestinians and Israelis or international ones, display their messages visually. In fact, and as compared to other published material on the Isreali-Palestinian Wall which were mainly focused on the political and social outcomes of the erection of the wall, this study sheds light on the wall as an open gallery space, from both sides of which artists could act. Of course, the different cultural arenas of both sides of the wall dictate and give impulses to different modes of expression and uses of visual vocabulary. Thus the wall appears as a work of art with two frontal and varied faces. Moreover, the specific tension gained through the fact that the artist who works on one side of the wall cannot see or relates to the art done on the very other side will also be illustrated in the images of the wall, which will be displayed juxtaposed to each other in the book.

Köln: Verlag der Buchhandlung Walter König
150 images
ISBN: 978-3-86560-948-9
EUR [D] 29,80