Category: activism

block celebrities

cate blanchett wears a dress at an award ceremony with some of the colors of the palestinian flag and everyone is thankful. it’s so little, folx. so very little for someone with that kind of platform and privilege. celebrities, except for susan sarandon, are useless. they will risk nothing, not even a tiny role in a film or a random award, to speak out against genocide. tiktokers urging people to block celebrities have the right idea.

recreating history

My IG account was hacked and deleted on April 9th this year. A kind of erasure. I will be recreating history off and on by digging into posts archived elsewhere by friends and collaborators. Here is one from @phototrouveemagazine??

Repost from @phototrouveemagazine:

Spotlight on issue 12 featured artist Mara Ahmed @mara__ahmed. “My art practice focuses on crossing borders and dismantling political and cultural boundaries. I work in multiple disciplines and narrative formats to tell marginalized stories and build community. The personal and political are intertwined in my practice. For example, the experimental short film, Le Mot Juste (2021), which was selected for an exhibition by Chicago’s South Asia Institute, is a fusion of autobiography, film, and dance. It spotlights three languages: Urdu, French, and English. In the analog and digital collage series, This Heirloom (2012-2014) which has been widely exhibited in New York and California, I recreated my own history by using old black and white photographs sourced from my family archive. In conjunction with my NYSCA-funded film, Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation (2023), I created three collages that subvert the colonial male gaze in found postcards from the British Raj (early 1900s). My aim was to rewrite history by relocating South Asian women from derelict studios, where they had been subjected to Orientalist fantasies, and reconnecting them to their roots. I placed the women in their native cities, adorned with architectural details and built with Indian textiles.”

Return to Sender Review by Cathy Salibian

Cathy Salibian: ‘To me, that is the evocative edge of “Return to Sender.” Yes, it’s gratifying to see a current generation of South Asian women take back their images and stories. It’s even more illuminating—and unsettling—when I take or view a photograph, to ask myself: What is going on here? Who is the viewer, who is the viewed? What assumptions and power dynamics are encoded in this artifact? What is my role in all of this? This is how Ahmed invites participation in the living edge of history.’

Brilliant film review in the Beacon. Pls join us for a Rochester premiere and community discussion on May 4, 12pm, at the Cinema.

Return to Sender | Rochester Premiere at ROC Cinema

Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation is coming to Rochester, New York, on May 4th at 12pm.

The screening will be followed by a panelist discussion. Seating is limited. You can buy your tickets below.

PROGRAM DETAILS: Come join us for the Rochester premiere of Mara Ahmed’s Return to Sender, an afternoon of film & community discussion at ROC Cinema! 

Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation is a short, experimental film directed and produced by Mara Ahmed. This project was funded by a NYSCA grant. It pushes the documentary medium in unexpected ways by opening with three contemporary South Asian American women who recreate British colonial postcards from the early 20th century. Dressed in lavish traditional attire and jewelry and shot exquisitely in a darkened studio, the women emulate the awkward poses of the postcard women, only to subvert the colonial male gaze and acquire autonomy by choosing an action of their own. This symbolic ‘returning’ of the Orientalist gaze is layered with discussions about Eurocentric beauty standards, representations of South Asian women in media and culture, stereotypes, othering, identity and belonging. The film hopes to create community by facilitating conversations about erasure and the politics of representation.

Join us for an afternoon of movie magic at ROC Cinema. You will be transported into a world of early 20th century postcards and all the conversations they provoke. Be part of the discussion with panelists Urvashi Bhattacharya, Hernease Davis and Sumayia Islam, as well as Director Mara Ahmed. Don’t miss out on this exclusive event – mark your calendars now! See you there!

DATE: Saturday, May 4, 12:00 – 2:00 PM

VENUE: ROC Cinema (957 S Clinton Avenue, Rochester, NY 14620) is a luxury theater featuring the latest food trends, drinks, and first class entertainment. You’ll have an electrifying night, while watching a movie.

PANELISTS: Learn more about panelists Hernease Davis, Urvashi Bhattacharya and Sumayia Islam here.

FILM REVIEW: Read Cathy Salibian’s brilliant film review in the Rochester Beacon here.

Support Deema Dalloul

Friends, I would like to draw your attention to another gofundme, another family trying to escape the massacres in Gaza. This is Deema Dalloul, a 20-year old writer who shares her experiences of loss and displacement in the midst of a genocide in her Gaza diaries. Here is part of an entry from March 30, 2024. Pls help with whatever amount you can. Every bit matters ??

‘At first, I used to believe that small families are the best fit: you don’t need lots of luggage and it’s not even costly to escape at any moment. One car could be more than enough, no struggles with one room, and certainly, a single bed might do the trick. Yet, all my beliefs were altered once my friend’s twin brothers became martyrs in the south, away from all their other siblings, leaving a heartbroken family struggling to survive again with missed fractions. I realized that large families could do better in such tragedies. No matter how much effort it takes to get them in one car, or how many mattresses they might own — not to mention the food they would demand — it’s still a blessing to have someone left if (God forbid) any misfortune occurs.

Yet again, all of these reflections were to evaporate once again, after another friend told me that her family had been divided. Part of them were forced to the south, while the others remained in the northern areas. Other family members were sent to the sky sooner than they could have ever imagined. They have no way of contacting each other: they live in the continuous horror of “not knowing.” Even a tiny word can cause them to panic.’

You can read more of Deema’s work here.

Thank you

screening of ‘return to sender’ at stony brook

what a wonderfully organized screening of ‘return to sender: women of color in colonial postcards & the politics of representation’ at stony brook university’s humanities institute last night. a thrill to work with liz montegary, chairperson of women’s, gender & sexuality studies at stony brook, and to be a panelist along with avina mathias and emelyn pareja-garcia who both did an internship on this project. so many amazing friends and neighbors in the audience and then dinner at ixchel mexican cuisine to end the night on a high note.

Return to Sender screening at Stony Brook University

What a wonderfully organized screening of ‘Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation’ at Stony Brook University’s Humanities Institute. A thrill to work with Liz Montegary, Chairperson of Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies at Stony Brook, and to be a panelist along with Avina Mathias and Emelyn Pareja-Garcia who both did an internship on this project. So many amazing friends and neighbors in the audience and then dinner at Ixchel Mexican Cuisine to end the night on a high note.

what kind of eid

what kind of eid can it be? when the massacres in gaza continued throughout ramadan? when people were breaking their fasts with boiled grass? this is a surreal time. any joy one might feel is complicated, accompanied by a horrible sense of guilt. guilt for being ineffective, for being complicit, for being american. so many beautiful people in gaza. so many friends and their families. u are in my heart, palestine. u will be free some day soon. we will celebrate together then. inshallah.

Support Mariam Alkhateeb

Earlier in February, I was contacted by Mariam Alkhateeb, a 20-year old poet and medical student from Gaza, to add her poem to the Warp & Weft Archive. I was immensely moved. I collaborated with my friend Mazin M Hameed and together we translated the poem into English from the original Arabic. I asked my dear friend Ahyeong Kim to read the poem and an audio recording was published very quickly on February 26th. Mariam is now trying to leave Gaza along with her family. As the bombings and ground invasion come closer and closer to Rafah, it is a matter of life and death. May I urge my friends to support in any way they can – not just by liking and sharing this post (pls do), but also by contributing whatever is possible here. Thank you.

recap of my presentation at VSW

beautiful video synopsis of my presentation at the @visualstudiesworkshop on march 28th by marili vaca @democratandchronicle. thank u for all ur support genae and marili <3

Repost from @democratandchronicle:

Mara Ahmed @mara__ahmed spoke at the Visual Studies Workshop @visualstudiesworkshop in Mar. 28, 2024 to discuss her most recent film ‘Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation’ which will be premiering May 4 at ROC Cinema @roccinema 

Ahmed used archival video, film and lantern slides provided by the Visual Studies Workshop. She also created a space that allowed for open discussion and dialogue.

Ahmed’s documentaries center marginalized voices and focus on communities grappling with nuanced experiences surrounding racism, colonization and Islamophobia.

Video by Marili Vaca @marili.photography / Democrat and Chronicle

my talk at VSW

we had to bring in extra chairs to fit everyone tonight at the visual studies workshop. it was more than a full house. so many people i love and admire in the audience. a presentation about colonial postcards, internal colonialism, police brutality, and white feminism, with strong connections to palestine and the ongoing genocide in gaza. a question for the audience about how to develop a decolonial feminist lens and then a group discussion to figure out more humane ways of ‘looking’ at one another.

thank u hernease davis and the @visualstudiesworkshop

rochester, i love u. too many incredible people live here.

Visual Studies Workshop: In Dialogue with Mara Ahmed

I am thrilled to announce that I will be coming to Rochester, NY, on March 28th to present a dialogue between my work on colonial postcards and the Visual Studies Workshop’s film and lantern slide archives!

This will be an exciting conversation where we will see clips from my new film, about the aftershocks of colonialism, juxtaposed against film clips from Rochester in the 1970s that talk about police control and violence. We will make connections to current political power systems and pay special attention to the representations of women from the global south and white feminism. I make a lot of presentations, but this is the first time I have engaged with an institution’s archives and located my work within that framework.

Pls join us and add to the convo. You can register here.

Here is more info from the VSW’s website:

Mara Ahmed is an interdisciplinary artist and award winning activist filmmaker. Mara’s documentaries center marginalized voices and have focused on communities grappling with nuanced experiences around racism, colonization and islamophobia. She will present a program that incorporates her work with postcards, lantern slides and films she has researched and chosen from the VSW archive. Mara will also present clips from her latest film, Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation, which was awarded a NYSCA film grant, and will premiere at a future time in Rochester.

The evening will culminate in a discussion with Mara Ahmed facilitated by Hernease Davis, the Assistant Curator of Education and Public Programs. This program will also be livestreamed via twitch.tv.

Stills from Return to Sender: Sumayia Islam, Fatimah Arshad, Urvashi Bhattacharya