Dust, Clay, Earth, Desire: Films from Afghanistan
program description
همه بردند آرزو در خاک
خاک دیگر چه آرزو دارد؟
All take their desires to earth,
What then is the desire of earth itself?
These lines of poetry, sung by Ustad Sarahang, pose a question that lingers unanswered in the films we have selected for this programme. In both Farsi and Pashto, the word for earth is khaak, a context-dependent term that can mean dust, clay or dirt; death as well as renewal. Khaak carries with it our dead ones and creates a life of its own:
An aged, weary traveller carries sorrowful news to his son, who toils in the depths of a coal mine; a lone woman searches in the dark underneath Pul-e Sukhta bridge among addicts huddled for warmth in the filth of the Kabul River; sculptures of ancient icons are shattered as Kabul is consumed by civil war; reels of film in metal cases are buried in the earth, left to wait for the next regime; a young man on foreign soil plots his journey to a home he never knew.
The khaak of Afghan history has long enveloped its cinema, which continues to confront the entropy produced by decades of revolution, environmental degradation and war in the shadow of imperialism. The films presented here trace various journeys as people from Afghanistan, moved by their desires, carve out their paths through this all-embracing, ever-recurring world of dust and dirt.
about the curators
AVAH (Afghan Visual Arts & History) Collective is an independent curatorial & research collective and multimedia platform. We came together upon recognising a lack of obtainable information and long term initiatives concerning the historical and contemporary practices originating in or relating to Afghanistan. Through gathering art histories and curating artworks we contextualise practices, and create a professional network. Our aim is to establish critical resources that will aid in understanding our collective past and equip a new generation of artists and cultural practitioners for the future.
The program was curated by the following AVAH members: Parwana Haydar, Barry Sadid, Hala Habib, and Moshtari Hilal
Iran / Philippines, 2020, 1h 20m
At the height of the USSR’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1982, 1.5 million Afghans took a long journey to the border of Iran to flee war.
Canada, Afganistan, 2018, 1h 37m
Laila Haidari survived child marriage and her own traumatic past to battle one of the deadliest problems in Afghanistan: heroin addiction. As the “mother of the addicts,” she must prevail over a crisis of addiction and a corrupt government in a country on the verge of collapse.
Canada, 2019, 1h 59m
Driven to create amidst war and chaos, Afghan filmmakers gave birth to an extraordinary national cinema.
Afghanistan, Belgium, France, 2024, 1h 46m
A Hazara family from Afghanistan seeks justice after the death of their daughter at Kabul University.
