As I Lament
Miriam Shenitzer, USA

     

As I Lament; Miriam Shenitzer, Boston, USA, 2013 This book is based on the 6th century pre-Islamic poem of Imru' al Qays, one of seven Muallaqa or “suspended” poems said to have been written in gold and hung on the walls of the Ka'ba in Mecca. In it the poet describes his sadness he feels on arriving at the site abandoned by his beloved. Here is the translation that first caught my eye: As I lament thus in the place made desolate, my friends stop their camels; They cry to me 'Do not die of grief; bear this sorrow patiently.' Nay, the cure of my sorrow must come from gushing tears. Yet, is there any hope that this desolation can bring me solace? Later I learned that the translation takes many liberties, but it's beautiful in it's own right. I also learned that “there's a long tradition of applying the "standing by the ruins" trope to contemporary civil war contexts and other military/political disasters in the Arab world,” so it turns out that I am following a tradition. The Arabic texts were copied by Khadijeh Mohieddin, Ali Alnamous and their 8-year-old daughter Sandra. They are from Syria, where the suffering continues. Description: modified concertina book, 8” x 13” closed; 8” x 39” open; Materials: pencil, marker, offset onto Duralar matte acetate I grew up in Canada, trained in Israel, and live in Boston. My work has been shown at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, the Canadian National Library, the DeCordova Museum and the Norman Rockwell Museum, as well as numerous galleries in New England. It is in the collections of Yale, Brown, Harvard and other universities, as well as the Fogg and Getty museums, and has appeared in The New Yorker and The New York Times. www.miriamshenitzer.com