Mladi levi | Basel Zaraa: WHAT WILL WE DO WITHOUT EXILE?

interactive installation

After World War II, Adorno’s words about the barbaric nature of art in the wake of the Holocaust were etched into our consciousness. Today, we don’t just read about the genocide being perpetrated by Zionist Israel against the Palestinians – we see and hear it, live! Just as we see and hear countries doing nothing to prevent it, or even enabling it. Despite Adorno, art did not come to a halt after World War II – but what is left for it today, when faced with a genocide that even the greatest activist efforts seem unable to stop?
UK-based Palestinian artist Basel Zaraa is returning to Mladi Levi festival for the third time. His installation Dear Laila focused on a family home in a refugee camp, while the performance As Far as My Fingertips Take Me, which he created together with Tania el Khoury, explored the experience of migration. In this latest installation, in response to the question above, he sets up a refugee tent and, within it, an imagined future world – one better than anything we have ever known. In the face of indescribable cruelty, radical hope might be all we have left.

By: Basel Zaraa
In collaboration with: Emily Churchill Zaraa
Sound artist: Pete Churchill
Newspaper designer and illustrator: Charlotte Bailey
Featuring the voice of: Sahar Qawasmi
Slovene voices: Katarina Stegnar, Grega Zorc
Sound design and edit of Slovene version: Rok Kovač
Local producer: Ajda Koloini
Thanks to: all the interview participants
Commissioned: Moomin 80
Co-produced by: Counterpoints Arts, Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture

The interactive installation is available in Slovene, Arabic and English languages.

Photo: Rafa Jacinto