Saturday evening Darb 17 18 opened the doors to its latest exhibition, “Khobzâ€, or “Breadâ€, which features 12 different artists orbiting the subject of the show’s title. The concept originated with Darb 17 18’s director Moataz Nasr, who told Bikya Masr that he conceived the project over a year ago when his team began pursuing artists at home and abroad to bring the idea to fruition. Nasr selected the subject because “everyone knows it and everyone feels it … I told [the artists] to take the idea and tell me something.†Although everyone “knows†and “feels†bread, the show’s intention is to redefine that encounter by removing the subject from its ordinary context and to creatively, and at times disturbingly, re-present it to the viewer. Spread throughout two floors, the exhibition questions what it calls “our customary relationship†with bread, unveiling the larger topics of distribution, life and death latent in bread as a symbol. One enters the show to find the floor blanketed with expired and hardened “aish baladi,†or local bread, positioned at the feet of characters painted upon the wall. The characters confront the viewer as the “other,†with their shared need and common humanity between them scattered on the ground. On the left, the wall is lined with Nathan Doss’s piece “Man Does Not Live From Bread Alone,†featuring five precise quartz stone representations of warm bread bloated with oven heat. The title’s biblical reference and the work’s material evoke the subject’s weighty cultural significance. Jasmine Soliman composed her paneled work, “Untitled,†with wheat, bran, and acrylic paint on canvas. Her introduction reads “inspiration comes from the small but vital elements that make up the essential parts of our everyday lives.†“Untitled†features simple lines and patterns that, upon closer inspection, reveal the complex textures and elements of their composition. Soliman says “such integral foodstuff cannot be separated from the social, political and cultural issues of our habitual lives.†Following a similar theme, photographer and designer Mohamed Khalifa presents a solitary piece of “aish†photographed and printed upon the wall, whose oven-burns form the shape of the African continent. Khalifa explained that in his first endeavor to work with the medium, he thought of bread as a symbol making him conscious of those who are without it. He told Bikya Masr “I called it ‘Bread and Crumbs’ because on the print you will see small crumbs around the bread. And in this world, some people get bread and others get crumbs.†While Khalifa represents the entire Earth with the subject matter, one of the show’s video pieces, “On Death’s Doorâ€, by Darb 17 18’s director, personifies bread as an individual. In a three-minute video displayed behind a curtain, a red hue fills the room like an oven and, projected on the wall, a piece of bread rises, grows, gasps and deflates to the soundtrack of a man’s labored breathing. Grappling with these existential themes, the 12 artists unearth meaning and significance from an upon-first-glance quotidian staple. If one is willing to plumb beyond that first glance, the show’s inspections and reinterpretations of the familiar offer a provoking and memorable experience. **The Khobz/Bread exhibition will be featured at Darb 17 18 in Old Cairo until November 7. Directions and hours can be found at www.darb1718.com . BM
