Founded in London in 2008, the Mosaic Rooms project of the charity A.M. Qattan Foundation presents Future Threads, a digitally experiential program from June to September 2020 featuring artists, curators and thinkers from the Arab world and beyond who are concerned with social transformation and concepts for the future.
Image above: Future Threads design by Marwan Kaabour
If it is an artist’s duty to reflect the times, what does that reflection look like in this moment of global crisis? Future Threads unpacks the disruptive potential of art and culture and profiles some of the most innovative and original responses by artists during this time of pandemic.
The programme features a live broadcast by Radio Al Hara, a station launched under lockdown in Palestine; a newly commissioned cross-stitch pattern by Jordan Nassar which draws on the rich history of Palestinian embroidery; a project which turned a phone’s voicemail system into a space for sound art by artists from across the globe; films by New Media Society who also discuss the impact of Covid on the Iranian art scene; artist Mariam Ghani‘s ongoing project Dis-Ease about international epidemic preparedness; and the streaming of critically acclaimed films by Larissa Sansour including In Vitro which premiered at the 2019 Venice Biennale.
Through conversations, studio visits, reading groups, films and music Future Threads seeks to imagine alternative visions and art’s ability to act as a tool to instigate radical and positive change.
Mosaic Rooms is a project of the A.M. Qattan Foundation, a leading charity cultural organisation based in London and dedicated to supporting and promoting contemporary culture from and about the Arab world. This includes initiating dialogue and debate on the most pressing social, political and cultural issues in the Arab world and beyond. The organization offers regular public programs that include visual arts, design, architecture, literature, film, music, food and current affairs. Its position is that public cultural organizations must remain both non-partisan political and non-religious in order to be as inclusive as possible.
