A conversation with Reem Fadda, Emily Jacir, and Beshara Doumani
Moderated by Lila Abu-Lughod and Brian Boyd, Columbia University

Jerusalem Lives was the title of the inaugural exhibition (opened August 2017) at the new Palestinian Museum in Birzeit. We are pleased to bring to Columbia Reem Fadda, the internationally recognized curator of Jerusalem Lives, Emily Jacir, a leading Palestinian artist whose work was featured, and Professor Beshara Doumani, Brown University, an historian who was instrumental in setting the course for the Palestinian Museum. They will explore the challenges to current politics of this innovative and hard-hitting exhibit that brought together artists, scholars, and community groups inside and outside of the museum. Why Jerusalem now? And what can this ambitious new cultural institution in Palestine do and be? Can the Museum connect a people and vitalize community? In the context of Israeli rule and a scattered nation, how will it work with other Palestinian cultural and community projects to educate local and international publics, preserve heritage, document Palestinian pasts and presents, articulate political aspirations, and spark the imagination of justice?