The Jerusalem Fund Gallery Al-Quds (March 21 - April 25, 2014) Portraits of Denial & Desire, Photographs by John Halaka

Abu Ghazi, Krayem Niaf Kanj, Born 1924, El Zieb Palestine. Lives in Nahr El Bared Refugee Camp, Lebanon / © John Halaka / Courtesy of The Jerusalem Fund Gallery Al-Quds

In his own words, John Halaka a Visual Artist, Documentary Filmmaker and Professor of Visual Arts at the University of San Diego, where he has taught since 1991, states, "Palestinian refugees have become the forgotten survivors of the world. Their experiences in exile have been deliberately ignored and their voices repeatedly silenced. While Palestinians continue to be reduced to an absence in their native homeland, the continuity of their stories and images ensures their presence and survival. Portraits of Denial and Desire is a multidisciplinary project that attempts to make the images and narratives of Palestinian refugees indelible, and their personal experiences in exile unforgettable.”

Artist John Halaka’s project preserves seldom-heard personal narratives from three generations of men and women who were displaced from their homeland, or were born in exile. The oral history archive, drawings, photographs and documentary film that comprise this work creatively present the testimonies of forgotten Palestinian survivors to global audiences.

John Halaka further explains the project, "The multi-disciplinary project employs four closely related components: a series of narrative photographs of some of the refugees I have interviewed; a series of mixed-media drawings informed by the narratives of the refugees; an on-line video archive that makes the interviews I’ve recorded with Palestinian refugees available for students and scholars researching the modern history of Palestine; and a documentary film consisting of the personal stories of six refugees. Individually as well as collectively, the components of my multi-disciplinary project represent fragments of a fragmented nation that has been deliberately shattered and its people broadly scattered in a global diaspora that continues to be concealed in the shadows of history. The narratives presented in the film, video archive, drawings and photographic images explore the refugees’ resilience, creativity and sustained resistance in the face of repeated cycles of devastating loss."

Umm Aziz, Amna Hassan Bannat. Born 1930. Sheikh Dawoud, Palestine. Lives in Borj El Barajneh Refugee Camp, Beirut, Lebanon / © John Halaka / Courtesy of The Jerusalem Fund Gallery Al-Quds

Abu Ghazi, Krayem Niaf Kanj, Born 1924, El Zieb Palestine. Lives in Nahr El Bared Refugee Camp, Lebanon / © John Halaka / Courtesy of The Jerusalem Fund Gallery Al-Quds

Hamed Mousa, b. 1910 (?), Deir El Assad, Palestine, Deceased 2013, Deir El Assad, Galilee / © John Halaka / Courtesy of The Jerusalem Fund Gallery Al-Quds

Umm Hussein, Melina Boutrous Alka. Born 1939, Ziara, Lebanon. Lives in Shatila Refugee Camp, Lebanon / © John Halaka / Courtesy of The Jerusalem Fund Gallery Al-Quds

John Halaka

John Halaka is a Visual Artist, Documentary Filmmaker and Professor of Visual Arts at the University of San Diego, where he has taught since 1991. As an activist artist, Halaka’s creative work serves as a vehicle for meditation on personal, cultural and political concerns. His drawings, paintings and documentary film projects are informed by the Palestinian experiences of displacement and the persistent desire of the refugees to reclaim their homes and homeland. "Through my work, I attempt to initiate a dialogue with the viewer that could hopefully instigate transformation, one person at a time."

Halaka has exhibited his artwork and screened his films regionally, nationally and internationally. John’s drawings from the series Landscapes of Desire were featured in a solo exhibition at the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn Michigan, through January 2014. He is the recipient of a Fulbright Research Fellowship in 2011-2012 to develop the second phase of the project Portraits of Denial & Desire, in Lebanon. John received his MFA in the Visual Arts from the University of Houston in 1983, and his B.A. in Fine Arts from the City University of New York Baccalaureate Program, with Brooklyn College as home school. He is of Palestinian descent and was born in El Mansoura, Egypt, in 1957.