Alan Gignoux: Review of Lost Homeland – a place as rare as its people | Art

Tthis place was once filled with conversation, the smell of cooking, laughter, comfort. Now I’m looking into a quiet, trash-strewn abyss. The eyewitness accounts that accompany photographer Alan Gignoux’s black and white photographs of Palestinian refugees and the homes they were forced to leave repeatedly tell of the abundance that came from these crushed fields – olives, seeds, figs, carob and grapes. Where there was life, now there is nothing. Great loss seems fixed on the faces of Gignoux’s characters, even as he looks back at his camera in disdain.

All of the Gignoux people were either displaced by the Nakba – the mass exodus from Palestine in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war – or by their descendants. They now live in refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, the West Bank or Gaza. Gignoux promised each of his men that he would return home in their place, and photographed them. The series provides a detailed overview of what happened in various villages in 1948, the conditions people left behind and the consequences for generations.

Standing in the Tulkarm camp in the West Bank, Fawzi al-Tanji, an elderly man wearing a keffiyeh who once served as a British Mandate police officer, holds testimony from his time in the Palestinian fishing village of Tantura, in the Haifa district, which is home to 1,500 other Palestinians. This torn document is the only thing they have in common with the place they used to call home. The IDF led Haganah movement attacked Tantura in May 1948; al-Tanji testified the execution of the men who were arrested during the conspiracy. According to the story below, an Israeli swimming pool and recreation center has been built on the site of the former village.

So the stories continue, each revealing another piece of the broken, seemingly impossible puzzle, each adding to the violence, pain and sadness. Gignoux emphasizes the strong connection that the Palestinians have to the country. These types of features seem to be rare, too, without the areas they once cared for.

Written works like these insist that we find resistance and courage. Here, the famous image is of Sana Abubkheet, who was 19 years old when she competed in the 800 meters race at the 2004 Olympics, the first Palestinian woman to do so. Gignoux captures him on the beach in Gaza, his place of study, in his tracksuit. Eyes closed, arms raised joyfully to the black sky, they represent the only moment of joy in the show. Denying many of these issues seems like continuing to live.

Gignoux’s documentary work, Homeland Lost, was originally supported by the British Council, and was created between 2004 and 2005. In this review at P21 Gallery, the stories have not changed, but the war in Gaza adds rich layers to the history. People who ran away Palestine as children are now grandparents; Their grandchildren are the same reality, a time that never closes.

The gallery space is difficult. A low ceiling with not enough light and a difficult corridor dividing the two rooms makes the view a little different – but the aim here is not really painting. Above, the video brings a lot of images of people and places, accompanied by words that have just been sent by Bint Mbareh and Joseph Sergi. It puts personal stories in a very lost place. Eight million Palestinians are said to have fled their homeland since 1948.

The Nakba of 1948 was a point of no return. Through this project, its links to this day are becoming increasingly evident. Today, 90% of Gaza’s infrastructure is in ruins. This isn’t about pictures, it’s about people, and how to protect and survive all odds.