“A series of works”
Khaled Sabsabi
16 June → 28 June 2025
Gallery
West Space presents a series of works by Khaled Sabsabi as an extension of Everything You Can Dream of is True.
We kill You (2016) is screening alongside three scratch video works not previously presented in Melbourne; A Selfie (2006), Try (2004) and south@lebanon (2003).
We kill You poetically engages with sensitive issues connected to contested geographies, histories, ideological movements and realities.
It was inspired by a 1972 poem of the same title written by the revered Syrian poet Nizār Qabbānī. Qabbānī wrote: “We kill you, o last of the Prophets […] ‘we’ve got a nice book, but we’re not good at reading”. Qabbānī is talking about Gamal Abdel Nasser, as well as about the Quran, but he’s also saying many Arabs are not good at understanding the Quran.
The poem is a mourning elegy in memory of Gamal Abdel Nasser, an iconic (and disputed) figure in the Arab world. Nasser is both a symbol of Arab unity and dignity, and a thorn in the side of the Arab Spring, ideologically used by Pan Arabian movements as well as by authoritarian and repressive Arab regimes.
We kill You is a major and multifaceted work highlighting factual contradictions and the effect these have had throughout the world. Furthermore, it addresses conflict and the rise of extremism and terrorism by expressively engaging with themes relating to nationalism, Islam, colonialism and political circumstances.
A Selfie, Try and south@lebanon reflect and engage with ideas that consider the way in which society interacts with notions of conflict, contested histories and the role the individual plays within this gambit.
As we become bombarded with increasingly filtered images relating to these themes, a sense of normalisation and complacency occurs, where emotions are blunted through the spectacle of propaganda determining image conditioning of such acceptable behaviours and practices.
“I believe that art can be a champion for the co-existence and respect of all possible differences. My work provides a potent reflection of this possibility during these times of large-scale and culturally motivated violence.” — Khaled Sabsabi
Open Monday to Friday, 11am → 6pm, and Saturday 28 June, 12 → 4pm
Khaled Sabsabi migrated with his family from Tripoli to Western Sydney, Australia following the outbreak of civil war in Lebanon. Since the late 1980s, Sabsabi has worked with communities, particularly those in Western Sydney, to create and develop arts programs and projects that explore the complexities of place, displacement, identity and ideological differences associated with migrant experiences and marginalisation.
