we are infinite. — Nicole Barakat

We will remember who we are & We will persist 2018 Cotton embroidered hand cut lamé on wool silk cloth photo: Nicola Bailey

We will remember who we are 2018 Cotton embroidered hand cut lamé on wool silk cloth photo: Nicola Bailey

We will remember who we are (detail) 2018 Cotton embroidered hand cut lamé on wool silk cloth photo: Nicola Bailey

We will persist 2018 Cotton embroidered hand cut lamé on wool silk cloth photo: Nicola Bailey

We will persist (detail) 2018 Cotton embroidered hand cut lamé on wool silk cloth photo: Nicola Bailey

Our soil still weeps for you & We don’t forget home 2018 Silk embroidered hand cut lamé appliqué on direct digital print silk satin photo: Nicola Bailey

Our soil still weeps for you 2018 Silk embroidered hand cut lamé appliqué on direct digital print silk satin photo: Nicola Bailey

We don’t forget home 2018 Silk embroidered hand cut lamé appliqué on direct digital print silk satin photo: Nicola Bailey

Our soil still weeps for you (detail) 2018 Silk embroidered hand cut lamé appliqué on direct digital print silk satin photo: Nicola Bailey

We don’t forget home (detail) 2018 Silk embroidered hand cut lamé appliqué on direct digital print silk satin photo: Nicola Bailey

We transcend time and plac e 2017 Hand cut found paper photo: Document Photography

We transcend time and place 2017 Hand cut found paper photo: Nicola Bailey

We transcend time and place (detail) 2017 Hand cut found paper photo: Nicola Bailey

We will return home 2018 Silk embroidered hand cut lamé on cotton velveteen photo: Nicola Bailey

We will return home (detail) 2018 Silk embroidered hand cut lamé on cotton velveteen photo: Nicola Bailey

We will heal in the now 2018 Hand cut silk, wool, lamé, cotton, direct digital print silk satin on linen photo: Document Photography

We will heal in the now (detail) 2018 Hand cut silk, wool, lamé, cotton, direct digital print silk satin on linen photo: Nicola Bailey

we are infinite. installation view 2018 Verge Gallery photo: Document Photography

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we are infinite.

Verge Gallery, The University of Sydney, Gadigal Country (Sydney, NSW)

28 February - 8 April 2018

Reclaim[ing] aspects of our lineages puts us in touch with a fundamental capacity to heal and sustain ourselves and our lands in practical and multi-dimensional ways not narrowed by colonist definitions and external powers.

Reconciling our relationship to our ancestors is a fundamental aspect of restoring peace, dignity, purpose and integrity to our lands, selves and communities.[1]

Layla Kristy Feghali

We are infinite.is an exhibition by Sydney-based artist, Nicole Barakat embodying her reconnection with the diaspora of objects from her ancestral homelands in the South West Asia and North Africa (SWANA) region.

Barakat presents a collection of textile works as manifestations of her practice of engaging with displaced, and often stolen objects held within Western museum collections including the Louvre, British Museum and Nicholson Museum.

To by-pass the gatekeepers and breach the vitrines holding these ancestral objects, Barakat reclaims pre-colonial, non-linear, receptive forms of knowing that are often devalued and dismissed by colonial and patriarchal institutions[2] - engaging with coffee cup divination, dream-work, intuitive listening and conversations with the objects themselves.

Barakat says, “The importance of reconnecting with these objects is to re-gather my ancestral ways of knowing in this critical time. When we remember the old ways, we remember the strength of who we are, the knowledge of our ancestors and our infinite relationship to our lands. When we restore our original wisdom[3], we reclaim our power and ability to transform and heal collective pain and suffering for ourselves, our communities and our lands. We make empowered strides towards dignity and justice for our people and our homelands.”

The exhibition critically considers connections between the violence of colonialism (under which many museum objects were acquired) and the current states of violence in the SWANA region. The volume of objects within the British Museum and the Louvre closely corresponds to the colonial presence of France and Britain within the region post WWI.

“Our homelands are still suffering the destructive impacts of the deceitful French and British carving up our lands and the creation of nation states that aligned with Euro-imperialist political and economic interests, inaugurating new colonial occupations into the twentieth century.” Barakat states.

Working with objects at the Nicholson Museum has opened dialogue around what it means for these displaced objects to be held by colonial institutions upon the sovereign lands of the Gadigal people. The artist notes, “As my ancestral objects sit encased in vitrines on Gadigal Country, I must also acknowledge that there is more than a two-way conversation between the museum and the object. There also exists a deep dialogue between the objects (and human remains) from my ancestral lands and the ancestors of this place.”

[1] Feghali, Layla Kristy Regather our Ancestors: reclaiming our indigeneity, re-membering our original medicines http://www.riverroseapothecary.com/swanaproject/ (accessed 24/1/2018)

[2] ibid

[3] ibid