Curated by Wafa Roz

Curatorial Text:

Written by Boushra Batlouni & Sima Ghaddar
Content edit by Wafa Roz                              

Hope in an Age of Dystopia 

General Exhibition Theme

Hope in an Age of Dystopia exhibition presents a selection from the Dalloul Art Foundation’s recent acquisitions. Across this collection, the pieces speak to each other as they tread the fine line between despair and hope. Many of the artworks are vibrant in their form yet often bleak in their content. Some works critique our current social condition with sharp wit, while others playfully invite us to join in on the joke. Yet, they all engage with a dystopian reality characterized by our inability to escape the confines of various systems of control. However, as is common within the dystopian genre, the ultimate motive is not to despair, but to imagine different paths for a better future.

A dystopia is an imagined world, often taking place in the future, where people live in some form of an unjust or oppressive society. In literature, for instance, novels such as George Orwell’s 1984 (published in 1949) and Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World (published in 1932) present future dystopian worlds that explore the effects of tyrannical governments and technological control, respectively. Most forms of art that deal with dystopian themes are a commentary about a particular moment in history and the collective anxieties and uncertainties it engenders.

This exhibition reflects upon and considers a multitude of domains through which power is exercised today: global capitalist economies and environmental degradation, tech industries and corporate power, laws and regulations, military complexes, and surveillance apparatuses (among many others). Domains of power structure people's daily realities, including their grievances, wants, needs, and feelings. These domains also perpetuate processes of labor exploitation and resource extraction from underdeveloped countries—all in the service of advanced economies, imperialist interests, and global capital accumulation.

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