CONSTRUCTIONS
Sound-installation (painting series on wood) 2007-2009Sound: Ahmed El-Azma
Through the diligent painting of countless buildings, El Ansari continues to engage in a process that parallels that of a construction worker confronted by the tedious task at hand. A system of hypothetical representation is created using the graphical repetition of forms. In this case, individual visual forms (buildings) are mass-produced to create an overall cluster- a city. One side is a reference to “ashway‘iyat“ (literally: random) or informal housing characterised by their red brick structures; the other, the smoggy commercial districts comprised of massive concrete apartment blocks. The work invites viewers to react and draw meanings through its serial graphic technique ( done here through the process) rather than an image that points automatically to a widely recognisable sign.
It is in this illusion of a city that we witness the two sides of a schizophrenic entity collide. Previously orderly, separate, divided, and distinct, in “Constructions“ the cityscapes are brought into confrontation-a disruption that is also imposed on the viewer through the silkscreen print of helicopters. This is compounded by the sound of an Apache helicopter flying overhead-betraying the lack of any real, living, or human presence, and transforming the viewer into an occupant of the buildings they see. The red bricks are tossed from one side of the wall to the other. The smog-shrouded apartment blocks, previously so consistently stable, static, upright-begin to topple.
