7. Akram Assam

17. November 2018 / Kooperation, Ausstellung

Akram Assam: The History Tree

At Bait Tarkib

Photos by Christina Werner

Photo by Yasir Razaq/Mahdi Al-Shididy

THE HISTORY TREE by Akram Assam was an installation of a tree trunk, and the annual rings on its surface were painted in a variety of colours. Larger coloured ellipses were also drawn into the packed earth surrounding the trunk, resembling planetary orbits. Each coloured ring reflected a historical period of the Republic of Iraq, and the rings on the ground expanded beyond the lifetime of the tree. Each visitor was invited to take a notepad and write down an event that was an important marker in time for them, imagining the relation of the life span of the tree, their individual lifetime, and the historical moment. Placed on the rooftop of the creative arts centre BAIT TARKIB, the tree – when imagined in full growth – seems to blend in with the row of palm trees in the neighbouring yards. It rooted the location of BAIT TARKIB in the neighbourhood and the city’s history. BAIT TARKIB is in a typical Baghdad building, originally a family home that was built in the 1920s, when the Republic of Iraq was founded.