Sherif El Azma

The Psycho-Geography of Loose Associations, 2007/08. Text-photo-installation.

The mega-city of Cairo is imagined through psycho-geographical investigation, where selected areas and districts cause a Cairo psycho-geographer named W to mould and force his subjective thoughts into wild associative processes, confusing reality and fiction. The installation is derived from the homonymous multimedia lecture-performance, first rehearsed within the 5th Meeting Pointsfestival (Brussels and various location, 2007-2008).
The journey-like narrative of the works uses subjective logic (or sometimes ill-logic) to question how the city itself performs (or sometimes dysfunctions) on the surface. Through such questioning, suspicion, paranoia – and on a good day mere reflection – the city of Cairo is imagined as both an organism and as an ever-changing consciousness, shifting between the objective, official representation of the city and a highly personal view. (Text: Sherif El Azma).

* 1975, Manchester, UK, lives and works in Cairo