The New Middle East
2007 | Interactive Installation; foam, magnet, neon, iron;
dimensions variable
by Oraib
Toukan
The
New(er) Middle East is an interactive installation of
a puzzle in the shape of a territorial map of the Middle East
made from suspended foam-magnet bits. The installation asks
you to re-assemble the map. The idea of creating the map as
a magnet puzzle came about when the artist stumbled upon a
scientific definition of memory as “the ability of a material
to return to its original shape after being subject to deformation.”
The installation she created is a humorous play on the so-called
‘New Middle East Map.’ The map was originally suggested by
retired United States Army Lieutenant Colonel Ralph Peters
as his ‘proposition’ of ‘how a better Middle East would look.’
The bits you have to work with are fragments of the region's
current nation states. They were created by superimposing
the Colonel’s proposed map of the Middle East onto the present,
post Sykes-Picot one, and cutting out the areas that formed.
The only part of the Middle East which is fixed in Toukan’s
map is Palestine. It forms the building block of the puzzle,
around which all other blocks can be assembled. This was inspired
by the treatment of “Israel and the West Bank” in the Colonel’s
plan as territories whose status is “undetermined.”
Oraib Toukan’s interactive installation amusingly reignites
discourse about the plan and possibly even the fabrication
of new conspiracy theories by allowing people to draw and
redraw the synthetic borders of an artificially assembled
and fluidly labeled area known today as ‘The Middle East.’’
|
press
clips