Many Egyptians often joke heartily that when running into people in North America or Europe they are asked if they own a pyramid or if they ride camels to work.
While this may seem like good-natured naiveté, it is rooted in the early days of European photography, when well-to-do persons journeyed to the ancient land of the Pharaohs and returned with rather Orientalist interpretations of their experiences.
Photographer Yasser Alwan examined how European photography depicted Egypt at the end of the 19th century and the sociological impact such imagery plays on the creation of stereotypes.
The slides Alwan presented in his lecture “Imagining Egypt at the Contemporary Image Collection provided a trek through time of Egyptian portraiture, from the earliest Orientalist representations, through to the 20th century.
The lecture explored how visual representations can create a society’s image far removed from reality. What concerns Alwan is how people see other societies in other parts of the world.
“We must agree on one principle . portraits give importance to individuals, he said to kick off his lecture.
He is also saying though that portraits can just as easily deny individuals’ importance.
To hammer the point home, the first slide in the lecture depicts a properly-suited European gentleman featured prominently in the shot, at approximately a 45-degree angle away from the camera.
Very respectable-looking.
The second slide shows an indiscernible Egyptian layman used for scale, sitting atop an Egyptian monument. To keep him still, though it hardly matters to the shot, the photographer told the man that the camera would automatically shoot bullets if he moved within the five to ten minutes it took to take the photograph.
Not all the photographs of Egyptians at the time were indiscernible. Some featured them clearly in traditional work positions or dressed up in costume.
Of course, Egypt was not the only area in the world to be simplified in such a way.
Alwan presented a picture of islanders being photographed for scientific research at mug-shot angles. Pygmies were flown to be “displayed in zoos. At the great World’s Fairs at the turn of the 20th century, Europeans and North Americans would pay to see groups from exotic cultures living their life in the artificial “natural setting.
Eventually of course, photography catches on in Egypt as well.
With its popularity growing, Egyptians begin posing, dressing up in borrowed clothes, and looking like, well, Europeans. Alwan says they “lost individuality but gained social dignity.
To conclude his slide show, Alwan shows without comment a series of more modern, Egyptian depictions of themselves. Cigarette ads show women wearing pharaonic outfits. Films depict hundreds of harem women kneeling in matching white outfits.
Alwan told The Daily Star Egypt after the lecture that it seems Egyptians reproduce themselves from Hollywood. “Why are Egyptians always clapping at that?
At the end he shows some of his own photography, which he says is criticized and not appreciated by most Egyptian audiences.
The shots feature Egyptians neither in distinguished poses, nor as artistic incidentals. Instead, mostly men, are featured prominently in natural surroundings – mostly in the street. He says his work is about dialogue, in contrast to the works of the early Europeans which he says are monologues.
One audience member asks why it seems these photographs are more poignant than their European equivalents. Alwan, who is originally Iraqi and lived in New York before coming to Egypt, responds: “Maybe people here have more emotional weight.
Alwan is compiling a collection of European photography, especially from Rudolf Lehnert and Ernst Landrock, two of the most renowned turn-of-the-century photographers.
Imagining Egypt should be ready before the Cairo Book Festival next month.
