Memoirs of a Martyred Earth is a multidisciplinary performance experience bringing together a quintet of Arabic musicians, women poets of the Arab diaspora, Belgian soundscape composition, and immersive visual projections in a meditation on land, memory, environmental devastation, exile, and resilience.
The projections include the stories and artworks of participating Arab American women visual artists from Detroit featured in The Amplification Project: Women Artists of the Arab Diaspora, transforming the auditorium into a living archive of voice, image, sound, and testimony.
At the center of the event is a poetic and ecological reflection on war’s impact not only on human beings, but on the earth itself — soil, water, air, trees, and collective memory. The event draws from texts such as Memoirs of a Martyred Earth by Ibaa Ismail, which evokes the earth speaking as a wounded witness to violence and displacement.
Through music, spoken word, sound design, and projected visual art, Memoirs of a Martyred Earth creates a ceremonial and contemporary gathering space where audiences are invited to contemplate grief, survival, environmental crisis, migration, and the enduring role of art in human resilience.
Poetry by:
Kamelya Omayma Youssef
Ibaa Ismail
Biba Sheikh
Musical direction is led by:
Laith Alattar (Detroit)
Didier Nietsche (Belgium)
Film imagery:
Zina Hakeem (Syria/Lebanon)
Part of Concert of Colors