PRESS RELEASE:
For immediate release April 26th 2017
Lebanese architecture and artist duo install in Wellington
Public art programme Letting Space announces its first international residency, hosting Lebanese architect and artist
collaborators Rana Haddad and Pascal Hachem. The pair have recently arrived in Wellington City where they will be
resident until mid May.
Rana Haddad, Assistant Professor at the American University of Beirut, is an established architect. Pascal Hachem is an
artist and designer. Haddad and Hachem have been working for the past decades in response to their everyday life
experience and shifting conditions culminating in temporary installations. Their body of work is described as highly
politicized, taking on bold issues through provocative installations, objects and performances. After 20 years of
experience within public institutions, they have been working in found public spaces in Turkey, Lebanon, and Italy.
Haddad and Hachem will provide a public presentation about their work at Adam Auditorium, City Gallery Wellington on May
10 at 6pm. Whilst in Wellington they will be working in the city with a site found for them through Urban Dream
Brokerage, Letting Space’s service that brokers space for ideas by artists and groups in the city.
Rana Haddad and Sophie Jerram from Letting Space met in Copenhagen in 2016 and recognised synergies in their temporary
practice.
“We are thrilled to be able to make the Wellington-Beirut connection and learn about strong experiences of public space
in space and time of international conflict,” says Sophie Jerram.
Haddad and Hachem say “We are the product of the war. And our work is still a reflection of our city and of cities. We
choose to look at Beirut as it stands today: a city riddled with danger, yet ripe with potential. Learning to embrace
whatsoever experience that comes to us.
“Beirut became our ready-made, be it a street, pavement, or a theatre. Drifting between architecture, design,
performance and storytelling, our professional practice and academics led us to discover new potentials in existing
conditions. We have absorbed all we have experienced, whether during the war years or in their aftermath. We’ve reacted
to the polarized socio/political and economic factors that have engulfed the state since then. We have become activists
in the city.”
The public talk is supported by the Wellington Branch of the New Zealand Institute of Architects and City Gallery
Wellington.
Public talk Wednesday 10th May 6pm, Adam Auditorium, City Gallery Wellington Radio Silence , Rana Haddad Beirut 2016