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Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige
Lebanese Rocket Society: Cedar IV, A Reconstitution, 2011
Iron sculpture, Corian
800 x 120 x 100 cm
Launched on November 21, 1963, 2011
Installation viewProduced by Sharjah Art Foundation
Photo by Alfredo Rubio
Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige question the fabrication of images and representations, the construction of imaginaries and the writing of history. Their works create thematic and formal links between photography, video, performance, installation, sculpture, and film, either documentary or fiction.
Their films include Memory Box (2021); ISMYRNA (2016); The Lebanese Rocket Society: The Strange Tale of The Lebanese Space Race (2012), Je Veux Voir (I Want To See) (2008), which premiered in the official selection of the Cannes Film Festival and was awarded Best Singular Film by the French Critics Guild. They also directed Enfances (2006); A Perfect Day (2005); Ashes (2003); Khiam 2000–2007 (2008); and Around the Pink House (1999).
The artists have participated in numerous solo exhibitions, including On Scams, The Power Plant, Toronto (2019); Unconformities, Acropolis Museum, Athens (2018); Still in need to Apologize..., Tranzitdisplay, Prague (2017); and Electronic Superhighway, Whitechapel Gallery, London (2016). Their work has also been exhibited in several group exhibitions, such as Time, Forward! V-A-C Zattere, Venice (2019); Climbing Through the Tide, B7L9, Kamel Lazaar Foundation, Tunis (2019); and The Haunted House, National Center for Contemporary Arts, Moscow (2017).
Hadjithomas and Joreige are the authors of numerous publications, including Two Suns in a Sunset, (Koenig Books, 2016); The Rumors of The World: Rethinking Trust in the Age of the Internet (Sternberg Press, 2015) and artists books such as Latent images (Rosascape, 2010) and Beirut, Urban Fictions (Mind the Gap, 1997).
The awards won by the artist duo include the Marcel Duchamp Prize, Association pour la Diffusion Internationale de l'Art Francais (2017); Best Feature Documentary, Doha Tribeca Film Festival (2013); and Best Feature Documentary, Doha Tribeca Film Festival (2012).
Their artworks are part of major private and public collections including the National d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, FNAC France; Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris, Capital Art Collection, Dubai, MCA Chicago; and Victoria & Albert Museum, London.
Born in 1969 in Beirut, they currently live and work between Beirut and Paris.
SAF participation:
Sharjah Biennial 10
Grounded in the context of Beirut and events that are close to their personal lives, the works of Lebanese artists and filmmakers Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige reflect the artists' ongoing interrogation of imagery, representation and history.
Sharjah Art Foundation presents Unsettled Objects, featuring new acquisitions and rarely seen works from the Foundation's Collection; the artists and works on display explore art history’s hidden stories.
Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige's practice includes feature films, documentaries and short films as well as photographic and video installations.