AN EVENING WITH JUMANA MANNA
9 December 2022
Avery Hall 114
1172 Amsterdam Ave., New York, NY 10027

Join the Center for Palestine Studies for a screening of Jumana Manna’s film Foragers (2022), followed by a talk by the filmmaker. The event will feature a screening of Foragers, followed by a Q&A and conversation with Jumana about the film, and her broader artistic and cinematic corpus. This event is co-presented by the Graduate School Architecture, Planning and Preservation.

Foragers (2022) depicts the dramas around the practice of foraging for wild edible plants in Palestine/Israel with wry humor and a meditative pace. Shot in the Golan Heights, the Galilee and Jerusalem, it employs fiction, documentary and archival footage to portray the impact of Israeli nature protection laws on these customs. The restrictions prohibit the collection of the artichoke-like ’akkoub and za’atar (thyme), and have resulted in fines and trials for hundreds caught collecting these native plants. For Palestinians, these laws constitute an ecological veil for legislation that further alienates them from their land while Israeli state representatives insist on their scientific expertise and duty to protect. Following the plants from the wild to the kitchen, from the chases between the foragers and the nature patrol, to courtroom defenses, Foragers captures the joy and knowledge embodied in these traditions alongside their resilience to the prohibitive law. By reframing the terms and constraints of preservation, the film raises questions around the politics of extinction, namely who determines what is made extinct and what gets to live on.

Palestine Cuts 2022-23 Curators

Nadine Fattaleh is a Palestinian writer and researcher from Amman, Jordan. She previously worked on projects at the Center for Spatial Research, Studio-X Amman, and MMAG Foundation. In 2021-2, she was the OSUN Fellow in Human Rights and the Arts at Bard College. She is currently a PhD student in Media, Culture and Communications at New York University. Nadine is a member of the Palestinian Social Fund as well as the editorial collective of Science for the People Magazine.

Nasreen Abd Elal is a multidisciplinary graphic designer, illustrator, and researcher whose work centers on the intersection of graphic design and justice-oriented movement work. She works as an information designer at Visualizing Palestine. She graduated with a degree in Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies from Columbia University in 2020.

Palestine Cuts is generously supported by Jeanne and Ken Levy-Church.

MASTERCLASS WITH AMEER FAKHER ELDIN
15 November 2022
Avery Hall 114
1172 Amsterdam Ave., New York, NY 10027

Co-presented by the Graduate School Architecture, Planning and Preservation

Join the master class with director Ameer Fakher Eldin, which will explore the filmmaker's craft as it relates to the making of his first feature fiction film, The Stranger (Al-Garib). The master class is a chance to intimately engage with technical and artistic processes of filmmaking, including the development of script, composition of scenes, the aesthetics of landscapes.

Introduction by Nadine Fattaleh, PhD student in Media, Culture and Communications at New York University.

Ameer Fakher Eldin is a Syrian writer and director based in Germany. He was born in Kyiv, Ukraine, in 1991 to Syrian parents from the occupied Golan Heights. His debut film The Stranger premiered at the 78th Venice International Film Festival (Giornate Degli Autori), where it won the Edipo Re Award and was selected as Palestine's official entry for Best International Feature Film at the 94th Academy Awards, followed by great acclaim at 43rd Cairo International Film Festival receiving two awards: The Prize for Best Arab Film in the festival and the Shadi Abd El Salam Prize for Best Film in the International Critics Week Competition.

Palestine Cuts 2022-23 Curators

Nadine Fattaleh is a Palestinian writer and researcher from Amman, Jordan. She previously worked on projects at the Center for Spatial Research, Studio-X Amman, and MMAG Foundation. In 2021-2, she was the OSUN Fellow in Human Rights and the Arts at Bard College. She is currently a PhD student in Media, Culture and Communications at New York University. Nadine is a member of the Palestinian Social Fund as well as the editorial collective of Science for the People Magazine.

Nasreen Abd Elal is a multidisciplinary graphic designer, illustrator, and researcher whose work centers on the intersection of graphic design and justice-oriented movement work. She works as an information designer at Visualizing Palestine. She graduated with a degree in Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies from Columbia University in 2020.

Palestine Cuts is generously supported by Jeanne and Ken Levy-Church.

THE STRANGER (AL GARIB)
Film Screening + Q&A with Ameer Fakher Eldin, moderated by Khaled Malas
11 November 2022
Lenfest Center for the Arts

In a small village in the occupied Golan Heights, the life of a desperate unlicensed doctor who is going through an existential crisis, takes another unlucky turn when he encounters a man wounded in the war in Syria. Overturning all community expectations in times of war and national crisis, he ventures forth to meet his newly found destiny.

WATCH TRAILER

Palestine Cuts 2022-23 Curators

Nadine Fattaleh is a Palestinian writer and researcher from Amman, Jordan. She previously worked on projects at the Center for Spatial Research, Studio-X Amman, and MMAG Foundation. In 2021-2, she was the OSUN Fellow in Human Rights and the Arts at Bard College. She is currently a PhD student in Media, Culture and Communications at New York University. Nadine is a member of the Palestinian Social Fund as well as the editorial collective of Science for the People Magazine.

Nasreen Abd Elal is a multidisciplinary graphic designer, illustrator, and researcher whose work centers on the intersection of graphic design and justice-oriented movement work. She works as an information designer at Visualizing Palestine. She graduated with a degree in Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies from Columbia University in 2020.

Palestine Cuts is generously supported by Jeanne and Ken Levy-Church.