Zineb Sedira: Lighthouse in the Sea of Time
Blaffer Art Museum
October 4 - December 14, 2013
For her first solo presentation in the United States, Zineb Sedira presents Lighthouse in the Sea of Time, a series of video installations and photographs documenting the artist’s journeys to two lighthouses in Algeria: Cap Caxine just outside the capital city of Algiers and Cap Sigli in the more remote Berber region of Algeria called Kabylia. Built and maintained by France when Algeria was a colonial outpost, the buildings transferred to Algerian control following the Algerian War for Independence (1954-62). Lighthouse in the Sea of Time frames the quiet poetics of watching, guarding, and taking care that envelop the lighthouses as historical sites. Through an interview with a lighthouse keeper and careful attention to visitor logbooks and technical equipment in the lighthouse archives, Sedira demonstrates the subtle ways that monumental historical struggles continue to resonate in the present moment.
Curator: Amy L. Powell