Blair, 2020

Part of an installation only made visible through photographic documentation, Blair (2020) was originally installed between Piazza del Campidoglio and Via dei Condotti in Rome. Strongly influenced by the scenography of Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez’s The Blair Witch Project (1999), this series explores how sculpture is represented in other media such as cinema and how the voodoo aesthetic is often used as an emblem of the extremes of a religion or belief. Islam, often described as an extreme, is one of the artist’s personal beliefs caught in this realm of representation and misrepresentation. Often, before being exhibited, Ben Hamouda performs a ritual for her sculpture by adding powders, spices or other small elements to the assemblage. The sculptures are assembled in an attempt to protect themselves, as well as the artist, and perhaps the viewer.

Photos by Flavio Pescatori.