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Lot Essay
Painted in 2009, Sliman Mansour’s Uncertain Landscape offers a glimpse into how narratives of diasporic and oppressed communities fill the void left by the absence of a cohesive story to navigate the rugged terrains of an obscure past.
In her article ‘Jerusalem: City of Dreams’, Tina Sherwell says: ‘Mapping is an area of contestation in the Palestinian context; and issues such as mapping, and archeology, are deeply politicized activities. Palestinians have been unable to create their own aerial maps of Palestine as they have no right to flight over the skies, nor is there a Palestinian airport or airline in operation. Mapping has been dominated by those who have wanted to conquer the land, whether it be the extensive mapping carried out by the Palestinian Exploration Fund during the early British mandate years or by the state of Israel’ (T. Sherwell, 'Jerusalem: City of Dreams', in Jerusalem Quarterly, Issue 49, Spring 2012).
Realised from an aerial perspective, Uncertain Landscape 1 is Mansour’s appropriation of digital mapping and photography in order to depict the landscapes of his own land using the authority given to aerial imagery and a way of reclaiming the right to fly its skies.
Sliman Mansour was born in 1947 in Birzeit, Palestine, just a year before the mass displacement and dispossession of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, known commonly as Nakba, the word for catastrophe in Arabic. As a painter, sculptor, and cartoonist, Mansour has lived through the continuing political strife and rebellion, witnessing the annexation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights, and the Sinai Peninsula. His early schooling happened at the Evangelical Lutheran School in Bethlehem, where he was introduced to European art history by his German teacher, Felix Theis. Later, he went to the Bezalel Art Academy in West Jerusalem to study drawing and painting under noted artist and academic Yossi Stern and Joseph Hirsch. As one of the rare Palestinians at Bezalel, Mansour completed his BFA in 1970, following which he played a pivotal role in shaping Palestinian modern art by co-founding the League of Palestinian Artists in 1973. In 1994, he established the Al Wasiti Art Centre in Jerusalem and served as its director from 1995 to 1996. Alongside his teaching responsibilities at Al Quds University, Mansour actively contributed to founding the Palestinian Association for Contemporary Art in 2004 and the International Academy of Art in 2006, both located in Ramallah. His work is part of prestigious private and public collections, including the Guggenheim Museum, Abu Dhabi; Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha; Institut du monde arabe, Paris; Jordan National Museum, Amman; The Barjeel Art Foundation, Sharjah among others. Sliman Anis Mansour lives and works in Jerusalem.
In her article ‘Jerusalem: City of Dreams’, Tina Sherwell says: ‘Mapping is an area of contestation in the Palestinian context; and issues such as mapping, and archeology, are deeply politicized activities. Palestinians have been unable to create their own aerial maps of Palestine as they have no right to flight over the skies, nor is there a Palestinian airport or airline in operation. Mapping has been dominated by those who have wanted to conquer the land, whether it be the extensive mapping carried out by the Palestinian Exploration Fund during the early British mandate years or by the state of Israel’ (T. Sherwell, 'Jerusalem: City of Dreams', in Jerusalem Quarterly, Issue 49, Spring 2012).
Realised from an aerial perspective, Uncertain Landscape 1 is Mansour’s appropriation of digital mapping and photography in order to depict the landscapes of his own land using the authority given to aerial imagery and a way of reclaiming the right to fly its skies.
Sliman Mansour was born in 1947 in Birzeit, Palestine, just a year before the mass displacement and dispossession of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, known commonly as Nakba, the word for catastrophe in Arabic. As a painter, sculptor, and cartoonist, Mansour has lived through the continuing political strife and rebellion, witnessing the annexation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights, and the Sinai Peninsula. His early schooling happened at the Evangelical Lutheran School in Bethlehem, where he was introduced to European art history by his German teacher, Felix Theis. Later, he went to the Bezalel Art Academy in West Jerusalem to study drawing and painting under noted artist and academic Yossi Stern and Joseph Hirsch. As one of the rare Palestinians at Bezalel, Mansour completed his BFA in 1970, following which he played a pivotal role in shaping Palestinian modern art by co-founding the League of Palestinian Artists in 1973. In 1994, he established the Al Wasiti Art Centre in Jerusalem and served as its director from 1995 to 1996. Alongside his teaching responsibilities at Al Quds University, Mansour actively contributed to founding the Palestinian Association for Contemporary Art in 2004 and the International Academy of Art in 2006, both located in Ramallah. His work is part of prestigious private and public collections, including the Guggenheim Museum, Abu Dhabi; Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha; Institut du monde arabe, Paris; Jordan National Museum, Amman; The Barjeel Art Foundation, Sharjah among others. Sliman Anis Mansour lives and works in Jerusalem.