This project is in collaboration with artist, Ayesha Mohyuddin. The video below is one of two projections, which are meant to either be shown on opposing walls or own opposite sides of a translucent screen, and includes the project’s main component: audio. One such installation is documented in photo gallery.
Two Prayers, Projection1 from Sophia Keskey on Vimeo.
Statement
The Muslim Athan (Call to Prayer) reverberates throughout Israel several times a day. Sometimes this prayer coincides with times of Jewish worship, and the services phonically blend together. We seek to combine these moments of personal spirituality with moments of a region’s spirituality.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has become a symbol in the Western world for Middle Eastern turmoil, a modern day war of attrition frequently mythicized into a war between faiths. However, the polarized rhetoric that ignores entire voices and narratives is not always reflected in everyday realities.
Jerusalem historically maintains a close spiritual and psychological tie to both Judaism and Islam alike. Sound is an entryway into the spiritual history of place and can reveal underlying patterns. Sound penetrates known spheres of pre-formed ideas, demanding engagement. Whether or not one is actually listening, the sound is heard, even when it fades into “white noise.” When the Athan is performed five times a day, and when the Sh’ma is recited frequently, it can be easy to ignore each other’s prayers. Isolating these religious sounds from their daily context forces the participant to actively listen. Through the natural polyphony of the two prayers, an unintentional (and perhaps abhorred) coexistence becomes intentional.
The prayers themselves are performed by two women and recorded away from Jerusalem. Traditionally, in both Judaism and Islam, the prayers are sung or recited, and led by men. Muslim women do not lead the Call to Prayer officially unless it is a gathering of only women; and Jewish women are not allowed to pray out loud at the Wailing Wall or to sing loudly in ultraorthodox services. By having two women officially perform these religious mantras, traditional female exclusion from public prayer and religious practice is subverted.
The piece itself involves a mixture of sound, as well as dual projection of the two prayers’ texts. Ayesha performs the Athan, Sophia sings the Sh’ma, one of Judaism’s most important prayers, with the sounds and visuals overlaid, ebbing and flowing. Krzysztof Wodiczko’s Tijuana Project, Francis Alys’ When Faith Moves Mountains, Christoph Buchel’s The Mosque: the First Mosque in the Historic City of Venice, Deborah Kapchan’s Learning to Listen: The Sound of Sufism in France, and Anila Agha Quayyam’s Intersections are the current inspirations for this project due to the aspects of private vs. public, sacred sounds and deep listening, undertones of coexistence, and visual components.
Sophia Keskey 