The Bidoun Library opens on January 12th at Tensta Konsthall’s new space in Sweden. The Library is a long-term project surveying the territory of the Middle East through its printed matter —objects in which complex and historical facts and ambitions meet.

More information here

Bidoun seeks a few good interns in its New York City offices!

Interns will be assigned to one or a combination of the following areas: magazine distribution, research related to Bidoun magazine or ongoing projects (such as the Bidoun Library), archiving, production, and beyond.

We seek special interns in three fields in particular:

Development
Publicity
Visual Arts

Interns who could work for a minimum of 3 months will be privileged.

Send cover letter outlining interests and CV/resume to info@bidoun.org with subject header BIDOUN INTERN.

Transition: An International Review is an award-winning journal of Africa and its many diasporas — where a strikingly large number of Bidounis got their start. On December 8th, Bidoun’s Michael Vazquez and an all-star cast mark the 50th anniversary of Transition’s founding with performances, readings, and an editor’s roundtable, hosted by Kelefa Sanneh and Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts.

Tickets and more information here.

On December 7th Bidoun’s Negar Azimi will join William Wells, Director of Cairo’s Townhouse Gallery of Contemporary Art, and Glenn D. Lowry, Director of the Museum of Modern Art, in a sprawling conversation about the arts in the swiftly changing Middle East. Azimi will narrate the various and vexed issues related to the production of Bidoun #25, made in Cairo.

Tickets and more information here.

Albert Cossery in Cairo

On December 6th Bidoun joins forces with New Directions and The New York Review of Books for a panel discussion on the late Egyptian novelist, Albert Cossery, whose greatest subject was laziness, and whose characters — anarchists, revolutionaries, retired philosophers — seek happiness by doing as little as possible. A scene in Tahrir Square from The Colors of Infamy, recently published by ND, appeared in Bidoun #25. The panel includes Robyn Creswell, poetry editor of The Paris Review, Cossery’s translators Anna Moschovakis and Alyson Waters, and Bidoun‘s Anna Della Subin.

Christie’s
8 King Street, St. James’s
London SW1Y 6QT

Farhad Moshiri (B. 1963)
SCREAM
Hand embroidered beads and glaze on canvas on board, in four parts
Each: 39 3/8 x 39 3/8 in. (100 x 100 cm.)
Overall: 78 ¾ x 78 ¾ in. (200 x 200 cm.)
Executed in 2011
£100,000 – £150,000

The evening will begin with a conversation between the Serpentine Gallery’s Hans-Ulrich Obrist and artist Etel Adnan.

Click here to browse the auction catalog.

Participating Artists:
Afsoon, Etel Adnan, Shirin Aliabadi, Lara Baladi, Yto Barrada, Trisha Donnelly, Fouad Elkoury, Armen Eloyan, Jeremy Deller, Elger Esser, Simone Fattal, Ramin Haerizadeh, Rokni Haerizadeh, Susan Hefuna, Pouran Jinchi, YZ Kami, Nate Lowman, Tala Madani, Haroon Mirza, Youssef Nabil, Timo Nasseri, Shirin Neshat, Paul Pfeiffer, Walid Raad, Hesam Rahmanian, Shirana Shahbazi, Slavs and Tatars, Lawrence Weiner, Andro Wekua, and Carey Young.

Auction Committee:
Alia Al-Senussi, Antonia Carver, Chelsea Clinton, Maryam Eisler, Farhad Farjam, Dana Farouki, Coco Ferguson, Tony Shafrazi, Saadi Soudavar and Zeina Durra, Jimmy Traboulsi, Burkhard Varnholt, Sheena Wagstaff

For more information:

Isabelle de La Bruyère
idelabruyere@christies.com
+971 4425 5647
Dubai

Julie Vial
jvial@christies.com
+44 207 389 2170
London

Dina Nasser-Khadivi
dnasser-khadivi@christiespartners.com
+44 207 389 2170
London

Featuring contributions from Gini Alhadeff, Sinan Antoon, Anand Balakrishnan, Hampton Fancher, Sophia Al-Maria, Fatima Al Qadiri, Lynne Tillman, and more.

The twenty-fifth issue of Bidoun responds to the Egyptian revolution that began on the 25th of January. In April and May, a group of Bidoun editors went to Cairo in order to better understand what happened, and what did not happen, during the eighteen days of revolt and since…. Bidoun 25 is the result – the product of over fifty unique interviews in Arabic and English, along with roundtable discussions, political party platforms, TV transcriptions, overheard dialogue, dreams, tweets, and email forwards. The result is a composite portrait, at once disjointed and revealing, partial but not trivial.

The launch of Bidoun #25 at Artists Space will bring together friends from the Bidounisphere to reveal, perform, show and tell some of the things discovered in Cairo.

After-party featuring Egyptian shaabi music by Rainstick and Azizaman
Santos Party House
96 Lafayette Street
9:30pm til late

Ahdaf Soueif in Tahrir Square. Photo by Hossam el-Hamalawy.

Ahdaf Soueif comes from a family of activists and writers who have been some of the key protagonists in the recent revolution in Eygpt. She arrive in London having spent several months in Cairo reporting on the events as they unfolded. Soueif will be discussing her work and sharing her experiences of activism and writing over the past two decades, as well as connecting with colleagues in Cairo, in an exciting seminar on writings and the revolution.

Based between Cairo and London, Soueif writes in both English and Arabic, and her essays and reviews have been published in numerous publications, including: Akhbar al-Adab, al-Arabi, Cosmopolitan, Granta, al-Hilal, al-Katibah, The London Magazine, The London Review of Books, New Society, Nisf al-Dunya, The Observer, Sabah al-Kheir, The Sunday Telegraph, Times Literary Supplement, Washington Post and others. .

Introduction and question time with Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts

In the 1960s, an array of state-sponsored international magazines fought pitched battles — against imperialism or communism and/or their own governments — across the entire length of the first, second, and third worlds.

Michael Vazquez presents an illustrated lecture on pivotal moments in periodical diplomacy, with especial focus on Transition (Kampala / Accra), Tricontinental (Havana), and Lotus: Afro-Asian Writing (Cairo / Beirut / Tunis).

Michael C Vazquez is Senior Editor at Bidoun and a member of the Bidoun Library group. He was formerly Executive Editor of the revived Transition (Cambridge, MA). He writes often about music and magazines for Bidoun and other venues.

Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts is a writer whose work has appeared in Transition, The New York Times, Harper’s, Bidoun, and Essence among others. Her book, Harlem is Nowhere, the first volume of a trilogy on black utopias, is just out in the UK from Granta Books.

Artist collective Slavs and Tatars present Molla Nasreddin: The Magazine that Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve, a new book examining the history of that legendary Azeribaijani periodical, arguably the most important Muslim satirical political magazine of the 20th century. For the book’s UK launch, Slavs and Tatars will present Molla Nasreddin: Embrace Your Antithesis, including: a discussion of the book’s historical context; a case study of the complex Caucasus region; and an exploration of the issue of self-censorship, then and now. Guests will be offered their choice of red or white tea, alluding to Communism and Islam, the two major geopolitical narratives between which Molla Nasreddin — and Slavs and Tatars — navigate.