Photos from Night School 2024 Film Programme: Traversing Landscapes

El Chinero, A Phantom Hill

Transitions

The Unofficial Countryside

Blue Honda Civic

Shadegan

Sharing a few words and photos from the screening event on I worked on for Night School 2024 Film Night at Jameel Arts Centre, which took place on Saturday, January 20, the second of three public events for this year’s edition of Night School run by Todd Reisz.

Traverisng Landscapes, a program of 5 short films I put together with Todd Reisz was a response to this year’s theme “There You Are”. It included:

El Chinero, A Phantom Hill (Bani Khoshnoudi, 2023)
Transitions (Aurèle Ferrier, 2017)
The Unofficial Countryside (Jacob Cartwright & Nick Jordan, 2021)
Blue Honda Civic (Jussi Eerola, 2020)
Shadegan (Ako Salemi, 2019)

We started in a rugged terrain in Mexicali, Northern Mexico, moved on to a deserted Las Vegas, headed to the edgelands of Manchester, meandered on empty roads of Finland, and ended in Shadegan Wetlands in Khuzestan, Iran. After the films, Todd and I discussed some of our thoughts on the films and invited audience members to share their thoughts too.

We found ways to connect themes of the films to Dubai, current news, and talked about how we navigate in our environments collectively or individually, about what is visible, hidden or erased in landscapes, landscape as safe and familiar spaces, but also as spaces that hold violent memories. In my introduction I talked about how a film like El Chinero, A Phantom Hill (Bani Khoshnoudi, 2023) about unrecorded deaths and disappearances made me think about how we are witnessing a genocide broadcast live with countless footage for future archives, and yet the murder of Palestinian civilians and crimes that defy international laws continue.

A “Free Palestine” banner appeared in The Unofficial Countryside (2021), and Gaza was mentioned in the song River Euphrates by Pixies (1988), “Stuck here out of gas, Out here on the Gaza Strip" - one of the songs in a special playlist I made for the night before we started the screenings (the playlist is added below).

I was happy to hear thoughts and questions from the audience which included comments and concerns about the sameness of architecture in many cities, architecture that doesn’t respond to specific needs of a place and people, the fallacy of efficiency, issues related to over construction and urban development go back many decades and not unique to present times only, and more.

It was a lovely night in a cosy setting with a soothing night-time view of Dubai Creek as a backdrop which complimented some of the films that were shown. I’m a stickler for dark screening rooms, but I’ve noticed Jameel Arts Centre’s lobby setting at night works for certain types of films that include images of nature and landscape.
Also, when I saw the photos of Todd and I with lamps on either side of us, it made me think we should start a new show called Between Two Lamps.

Huge thanks to Todd for inviting me back to do this, a meaningful and enjoyable collaboration (you can read about previous Night School film screenings here).

Thanks to Antonia Carver and Jameel Arts Centre for giving us the space to do this. Extra thanks and special mention to Uns Kattan, Giacomo Pietro Lamborizio, Alex Wachira, Jannah Hernandez for their care and support.

Thanks to everyone that attended to watch the films and joined the discussion, and more importantly, thanks to the filmmakers for letting me show their work.

Photo credits: All photos by Giacomo Pietro Lamborizio from Jameel Arts Centre who graciously documented the evening, except for the last one which is by my brother Khalid Mezaina.