Africa/Middle East
With 430 color photographs, Mia Gröndahl’s “Revolution Graffiti: Street Art of the New Egypt” (American University in Cairo Press) offers a full and vibrant look at street art in Egypt. The photographer and author, who lives in Cairo, explains that graffiti...
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Abdulrahman Katanani lives and works where he was born: a dilapidated former hospital in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Beirut, which have sheltered hundreds of Palestinian refugee families since 1948. His mother gave birth to...
At a press conference Tuesday, Tunisian culture minister Mehdi Mabrouk expressed his support of artist Nadia Jelassi, who has been accused by a Tunisian court of sacrilege, harming public order, and harming public morals with her artwork, “Celui qui n’a pas...
As Syrian strife keeps building (insurgents in Aleppo are now facing air strikes), the government is also waging nonviolent attacks on its critics: Three Syrian filmmakers say that they were fired by the ministry of culture for criticizing the...
Iran's cinema scene has had a hard time of it recently, with the government laying a heavy hand on the industry — or at least trying to. Jafar Panahi, banned from making films and put under house arrest after speaking out against Iranian...
Usually a major donation to a museum is cause for celebration, but the recently announcement that Boston's Museum of Fine Arts had received a gift of 34 West African artworks from Robert Owen Lehman is provoking as much criticism as...
As one of the greats of avant-garde fashion, Japanese designer Yohji Yamamoto is no stranger to taking risks. His silhouettes, often tailored with playful ruffles or dramatic draping, can distort rather than enhance the figure of the person wearing them...
Palestine acquired its first World Heritage site last week when UNESCO added the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem to its "World Heritage in Danger" list. As ARTINFO France previously reported, the World Heritage committee...
In 2007, Taliban forces drilled into the face and torso of a 1,500-year-old Buddha relief in Jahanabad, Pakistan, injecting explosives. The dynamite in the shoulders of the 20-foot-tall carving failed to go off, but the charges in the face exploded, sheering...
What is more important to an incipient democracy: the freedom to practice your religion, or the freedom to criticize it?Over the past month, many artists in Tunisia have found themselves at the forefront of a battle between ultra-orthodox Salafist Muslims and...
