June - April 2024
Forma, London
Sonic and digestible programme
'Rumbles from the gut' is a durational series of planting, reading, sounding and zine-making, devised in response to the slow and decolonial archiving practice of the West Asian and North African Women's Art Library (WANAWAL). Unfolded across the exhibition period of ‘don’t worry i won’t forget you’, it highlighted sound and food as a resistant medium to challenge silence and sterility conventionally coded within the Colonial Archive. In June, we began with growing in the garden with artist Alia Hamaoui, who built a planter-bench inspired by “qabqab” - a pair of historical bathhouse clogs worn by WANA women. On the last day of the exhibition, she was joined by artists Riwa Saab, Bint Mbhareh, along with archivists Êvar Hussayani, Sarah Hamed and artist Shamiran Istifan from the WANAWAL on a finissage of events to activate stirring, spewing and digestion of bodily histories and knowledge, as sage plants were harvested and shared in cupfuls of tea. This programme was co-curated with Elisha Fall.