“Eschewing sensationalized or stereotypical imagery of those who live in so-called war zones, Hazara’s installation polemically asked whether there is a place for such works within platforms largely incapable of coming to terms with their culpability in what is being beheld.”

Publication: “Irreconcilable Paradox: Aziz Hazara,” Artforum (October 2023): 188.

Keywords: art, contemporary, artist, exhibition, review, Aziz Hazara, multichannel, video, installation, film, land, landscape, mountain, urban, natural, environment, atmosphere, terrrain, territory, rock, stone, sound, music, alarm, whistle, sirens, boys, men, children, girls, women, play, games, representation, interpretation, reductive, stereotypes, Orientalism, struggle, perseverance, strength, endurance, colonization, occupation, invasion, war, conflict, unrest, news, media, Taliban, suicide, bombings, attacks, explosions, disasters, tragedy, tribulations, adversities, distressing, horror, spectatorship, spectacle, image, consumption, voyeurism, sympathy, empathy, culpable, complicit, apathy, indifference, others, alterity, US, United States, American, army, military, insurgencies, kidnappings, militias, displacement, refugees, Afghanistan, South Asia, Baghdad, Iraq, Southwest Asia, Arab, Muslim, Afgan, international, global, Mercer Union, Toronto, Canada 

Image: Vuk Dragojevic, Mercer Union, Aziz Hazara