Irene Barberis

Crossing the Line: Drawing in the Middle East 2
International Conference and exhibition program Global Centre for Drawing, American University in Dubai.

2014

Hosted by the Department of Visual Communication, in the School of Architecture, Art & Design at the American University in Dubai, and partners with the Global Centre for Drawing, Melbourne Australia.

Crossing the Line 2: Drawing in the Middle East - intersections of transdisciplinary practice and understanding brings together specialists from various fields of research and practices to examine the role of drawing in the contemporary Middle East and its wider international interactions. 

Crossing the Line2 : Drawing in the Middle East, -  ‘location’

Tracing the Lineage: Deconstructing the title – "Crossing the Line: Drawing in the Middle East”
Crossing the Line : What actually does this mean?
Various dictionaries say that ‘Crossing the Line ’or ‘to cross a line’ ‘is to go too far, step over the line …move into uncharted territories, cross from one location to another, or more literally physically ‘to cross a line’.
The force in the meaning propels us to think of something in a negative sense – you have ‘crossed the line’! or in a more positive sense – we are crossing the line – moving forward…we WILL go into uncharted territories….”
As artists, designers, scientists, in fact in any creative domain - we desire or aspire to/cross the line or ‘a line’ – to go further, think deeper, wider more incisively…to push against the boundaries and enlarge our understandings, locations, our knowledge, and experience as human beings.
Drawing in the Middle East – Here is a twofold expression, a double entendre – it is either – ‘Drawing in the Middle East’ – a pulling inwards toward a centre or point – or a geographical location of ‘Drawing in the Middle East ‘– the title was meant to do both – a call for attention through dialogue – in this case through the visual language of drawing throughout the Middle East – and it is also a ‘count’, a type of audit of ‘drawing’ that is happening in the Middle East now – a gathering of artists, ideas, perceptions and projections.

Dr. Irene Barberis

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