From behind of the monument

A film essay about the relationship between the image, the spectacle, and the spectator. The narrative is built around Mohamed Mahmoud Street in Cairo and the battle that happened there between the protesters and the riot police in 2011. The film speaks about the aftermath of an event creating a third reality for an understanding of what happened. It is not the street, the TV screen, but the reality of an abstracted space, such as a museum that allows for a different reflection of a story that by itself creates a new form of representation. This story is about how political images are turned into spectacles of the reality and how representation fails to go beyond its nature. It is also about an attempt to become an active participant in the event and the fear of touching the unknown. In the aftermath we all become the spectators.

Jasmina Metwaly is a visual artist and filmmaker based in Cairo, co-founder of 8784 h project and a founding member of Mosireen video collective.