Through the ICD Brookfield Place Arts Program – a platform focused on supporting local and regional creatives – this show invites audiences to explore shared experiences united in moments of community and exchange. The title of the show calls attention to a Palestinian mourning ritual of kneading, baking, and eating bread after loss, borrowed from a performance by former Dar Jacir Land Program resident Shayma Hamad: “Pour the water like tears upon the flour until it becomes like grains of soil,” recalling the sacred rituals of healing between the body and the earth. This thought-provoking exhibition visualises collective narratives woven together by artists working between Gaza and Ireland and Bethlehem to the territories known as Brazil. Water like tears, flour like soil brings participating artists together in the Gulf to share these significant global solidarities built through collective cultural resistance.
Curated by New York City-based curator Camila Palomino, in dialogue with Emily Jacir, founder of Dar Jacir, Water like tears, flour like soil draws on the deep relationship between memory and transformation. Palomino’s work emphasises the intersection of memory and place-making, lending a thoughtful and poignant lens to the exhibition.
We are so honoured to partner and collaborate closely with Dar Jacir and their incredible team. Their commitment to preserving and promoting Palestinian heritage deeply resonates with this exhibition. After witnessing the impactful work they do both in Palestine and globally, we were compelled to reach out and work alongside them to curate and produce this show at ICD Brookfield Place. Working alongside Emily and Camila has been a true pleasure, and I believe this exhibition will be our most powerful yet.
Malak Abu Qaoud, Director of ICD Brookfield Place Arts Programme
The exhibition features the works of renowned artists Adam Broomberg, Ahmed Al-Aqra, Aline Baiana, Andrea De Siena, Dina Mattar, Dina Mimi, Dirar Kalash, Duncan Campbell, Emily Jacir, Mohammed Hadia / Biishoss, Hazem Harb, Mohammed Al Hawajri, Mohanad Smama, Rafael Gonzalez, Samer Albarbari, Shayma Hamad, Stéphanie Janaina. Each piece reflects a commitment to cultural resistance and storytelling, uncovering layered histories that cross borders and generations.
Dar Jacir for Art and Research—once a family home—is now a vibrant, artistic haven along the historic Jerusalem-Hebron Road. It is celebrated for its emphasis on hospitality and interdisciplinary collaboration. By hosting residencies and fostering creative exchanges across various mediums, it has become a nurturing ground for innovative artistic expression.
Through this exhibition, the spirit of Dar Jacir will resonate within Dubai, inviting audiences to connect with powerful shared narratives. Experience this unique exploration of art that reflects the past and inspires a more connected future.
Exhibition Details:
● Water like tears, flour like soil opens on November 13th 2024, at The Space, Level 1, ICD Brookfield Place, Dubai.
About Dar Jacir for Art and Research
Founded in 2014, Dar Jacir for Art and Research is an interdisciplinary experimental learning hub that fosters cross-cultural and intergenerational exchanges. A process and practice-oriented platform, it is devoted to educational, cultural, and agricultural exchanges and productions for the Bethlehem community and beyond. Through a participatory approach, collective knowledge is created, experimental new works are produced, and structures for care and repair are fostered. Dar Jacir is the only artist-led space in the Southern West Bank that provides arts education and residency programs for both Palestinians and internationals, operating across visual arts, sound, cinema, performance, dance, literature, and agriculture. Together with its diverse community of artists, farmers, researchers and cultural workers Dar Jacir brings together a broad public that is deeply involved in community activity and collaboration in a particularly shattered territory. Intimacy is at the heart of the project. Artist-led and women-led, it facilitates and gives agency to artists and participants to lead, ask questions, and encounter international and local artists, thinkers, and cultural leaders. Emily Jacir and Aline Khoury are the co-directors.
About Camila Palomino
Camila is a Peruvian-American curator, researcher, and writer from Queens, New York. Her research is invested in aesthetic, political, and transregional relationships between urban infrastructures and memory. Camila has organized exhibitions and programs at institutions including Abrons Arts Center, Hessel Museum of Art, and Sculpture Center. She has previously held curatorial and research positions at the Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School, 58th Carnegie International and The Drawing Center. Her writing and interviews have been published in exhibition catalogs and in periodicals such as Art21, CURA., Mousse, and Topical Cream, and she was the guest co-editor of the fifth issue of Viscose Journal, “Retail” which focuses on the role of fashion retail within urban spatial politics. In 2023, she was awarded a research grant from The Graham Foundation. She is currently a resident on NTS Radio where she hosts Saywite, a radio platform for contemporary and experimental music from the Andes, Abya Yala, and their diasporas. She serves on the Board of Dar Jacir.
About ICD Brookfield Arts Program
ICD Brookfield Place Arts Program creates community and opportunity through the transformative power of the Arts. A vibrant and open space, we seek to engage and welcome everyone, inside and outside our walls, with the belief that having arts and culture in daily life positively impacts wellbeing.
ICD Brookfield Place Arts is a gateway for discovery and support for local and regional talent, offering visibility to emerging artists and more established creative practitioners through an array of year-round programming – from exhibitions and installations, to live music sessions, classes, workshops, and conversations. A collaborative commissioning and programming platform, participating artists and groups are selected for the relevance of their work and practice to our local community.
Elevating and amplifying the spaces, happenings, and artistic voices that bring meaning to a property like no other, ICD Brookfield Place Arts draws upon arts and culture as a foundational pillar for Brookfield Properties globally. Raising market standards in every aspect of the workplace environment, the program is at the heart of a new model that champions the potential of arts and culture to enrich, inform, and transform the daily lives of our tenants, the community of Dubai, and our global partners.
For more information, please visit https://icdbrookfieldplace.com/arts/.
