Iméra is hosting three conferences open-to-the-public on Friday, June 14, titled “Between the Real World and the Image world” dealing with Arab modernity, science-fiction and the relation to violent images. 1. Tarek El-Ariss will speak on “Arab Modernity as a Sci-Fi Project” (in English). He is a James Wright Professor and Chair of Middle Eastern Studies at Dartmouth College. 2. Stefan Tarnowski will address the question of images of violence in “Caught between the real and the image” (in English). He is an Early-Career Research Fellow at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and a postdoctoral researcher on the ‘Views of Violence’ project at the University of Copenhagen. 3. The organizer, Rania Stephan, will speak about her on-going Iméra science-fiction film project: “Diary of a Future” (in French). The conferences will be followed by a book signing and conversation between Tarek El-Ariss’s and Rasha Salti, researcher, writer, producer and curator of art and film, commissioning editor of “La Lucarne” for Arté TV, of Tarek El-Ariss’ newly released book “Water on fire”

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June 14 2024 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM at Maison des Astronomes, 2 Place Leverrier 13004 Marseille

Between the Real World and the Image World

10:00 AM -1:00 PMThree talks open to the public. Tarek El-Ariss, Stefan Tarnowski, Rania StephanMaison des Astronomes, 2 Place Leverrier 13004 Marseille
4:00 PM-6:00 PMBook signing & ConversationArtless Gallery & English Bookstore, 1 Rue Ferdinand Rey, 13006 Marseille

ARAB MODERNITY AS A SCI-FI PROJECT(in English) by TAREK El-ARISS


From the Suez Canal that connected East and West, to the Aswan Dam that rivaled the surrounding temples and their ancient gods by pushing Egypt into the future with electricity and industry, one could consider Arab modernity as a sci-fi project involving new conceptions of time and time travel.
This “time,” often referred to as “the modern age” characterizes a cultural and sometimes political building project but most importantly a project of accessing the future. This talk engages with these concepts of time by examining historical events from Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt and Saint Simonian utopia to the Nasserist attempts at entering the future through models of nationalization and national state building.

CAUGHT BETWEEN THE REAL AND THE IMAGE (in English) by STEFAN TARNOWSKI


When watching atrocity footage, the general theoretical assumption is that an event has been “caught on camera.” The direction of causality moves from atrocity to its capture or representation. The causal chain, moving from event to image, is also what forges a division between the “real world” and the “image world” (Sontag 1978), and helps keep these two “worlds” theoretically distinct. Most political and ethical questions therefore asked by theorists about viewing and circulating “violent images” thus assume the priority of an event over its photographic representation. In Syria, however, atrocities were frequently perpetrated so as to be filmed. The image’s arrow travels into the “real world” from its inception. This talk asks in what ways, if any, this change in the direction of causality shifts the political and ethical stakes of viewership and recirculation? 


DIARY OF A FUTURE (in French) by RANIA STEPHAN


This talk is an attempt to encapsulate the suspended timeline of a film project. In order to write the sequel of my film “Memories for a Private Eye #2,” a sci-fi fiction, my research became a rhizomic quest on science fiction, quantum physics, space exploration, Arab speculative cinema, and the world of Fringe television series amongst other bodies of evidence.
From the mysterious idea of its inception to assembling its constitutive elements, the film, before shaping into a concrete form, becomes a research project shifting in space and time, moving between different worlds and mediums, realities and representations, failures and progress, becoming in itself a sci-fi object.

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Book cover of Water on fire by author Tarek El-Ariss

BOOK SIGNING & CONVERSATION (4 PM – 6 PM) WITH TAREK EL-ARISS & RASHA SALTI AT ARTLESS GALLERY ENGLISH BOOKSHOP – 1 RUE FERDINAND REY, 13006 MARSEILLE

Water on fire is an evocative, insightful memoir by a leading voice in Middle Eastern Studies scholar, revisiting his childhood in war-torn Lebanon and his family’s fascinating history, coming to terms with trauma and desire. Water on Fire tells a story of immigration that starts in a Beirut devastated by the Lebanese Civil War (1975–90), continues with experiences of displacement in Europe and Africa, moves to north-eastern American towns battered by lake-effect snow and economic woes, and ends in New York City on 9/11. A story of loss, but also of evolution, it models a kind of resilience inflected with humour, daring, and irreverence.
 A contemporary “interpretation of dreams” dealing with monsters, invisible creatures, skin outbreaks, and the sea, it is a book about objects and elements, like water and fire, and about how encountering these elements triggers associations, connecting present and past, time and space.