Niyet #11: Arab Image Foundation: On Preservation, Custodianship, and Capacity to Care

Heba Hage-Felder & Vartan Avakian (Moderator: Özge Ersoy)

 

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Orta Format dedicates its Issue #31 to the phenomenon of intention (Niyet in Turkish and Arabic) and questions how experts from different disciplines approach this notion in their professional fields. The issue extends over three months and comprises 12 talks from a variety of fields, ranging from visual arts to philosophy, from political science to psychoanalysis, through which we attempt to interpret the phenomenon that decisively influences our production and judgments.

The next guests of the Niyet series are Heba Hage-Felder, Director of the Arab Image Foundation, and Vartan Avakian, artist and board member of the Arab Image Foundation.

The Arab Image Foundation (AIF) is a Beirut-based independent association forging new pathways for photography and image practices. Uniquely positioned at the intersection of artistic creation, research, and archiving, the AIF explores, questions and confronts the complex social and political realities of our times. The AIF collection of over 500,000 photographic objects and documents from and related to the Middle East, North Africa and the Arab diaspora has been gradually assembled over the last 20 years by artists and researchers and through donations. With a critical and innovative approach, AIF collects, rethinks, preserves, activates and understands these photographs through their multiple strata, and enriches the collection in the process.