Named after the Aramaic language that was supposedly spoken by Jesus Christ, and referring to “the Promised Land”, HaAretz HaMuvtahat employs the camera lens to reinterpret the biblical landscapes amidst a globalized world of consumerism, hyper technicality, mass tourism and war devastation. Compiled from photographs taken in Palestine, Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and Egypt, HaAretz HaMuvtahat was conceived with the aim to document some of the oldest continuously inhabited settlements in the world, such as Jerusalem, Jericho, Nazareth, Byblos or Damascus. At the same time, it aspires to provide a critical visual refection on the potential evolution (or regression) of conflictive ancestral regions referred to as the cradle of civilisation, while testifying to the ferocious power that capitalism and technology exercise in our postmodern times.

The selection of photographs featured in the exhibition focuses in the territories of Israel and Palestine, the epicentre of the jewish, christian and arab cultures. It documents the two road trips Roger Grasas made between 2014 and 2017: Towards the north, in the region of Galilee (Nazareth, Capernaum, Tiberias and the Golan Heights); and towards the south, to the regions of Samaria and Judea (Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Jericho, Bethlehem, Hebron, Beersheba and the Dead Sea).
Curator: Natasha Christia