How Did You Get Here? Syrian Art and the ‘Aestheticization’ of the Refugee Journey Towards Europe

Abstract

The journey marks a pivotal moment in the making of refugee bodies. In the context of the Syrian Uprisings of 2011 and the subsequent civil war, Syrian refugee bodies in movement have come to be perceived as a threat to the European body politic. This paper explores ways in which artists creatively engage with the Syrian refugee journey to answer back to dominant discourses that have acted to further displace refugees beyond the bounds of empathetic reach. This answering back has had the effect of aestheticizing (and, in some cases, fetishising) the refugee journey. The Walk, a live theatre work directed by Amir Nizar Zuabi; Khaled Barakeh’s installation, Self Portrait as a Power Structure; and the Abounaddara collective’s short film, Journey in Winter, are works that use diverse mediums to independently shed light on the transgressive act of border crossing at the heart of the Syrian refugee experience. In each of these works, the moment of border crossing marks the simultaneous moment of erasure of the individual. In the context of this erasure important questions are raised about the structural epistemic violence of representation and the efforts of artists to overcome this violence.