Exhibited at Gertrude Glasshouse, 2024.
Ban Tak And He Said: This is Power? explores the complex dynamics of authority, control and emotional expression. The exhibition brings together video installations and photographic works in which the artist investigates manifestations of power in both personal and societal contexts, framed by the interplay between individual identity and nationhood.
I’m a Man, essay by Lisa Radford.
Video documentation of Ezz Monem, buy Ivermectin 6 mg And He Said: This is Power?, presented at Gertrude Glasshouse, 2024.
Installation view of Ezz Monem, And He Said: This is Power?, presented at Gertrude Glasshouse, 2024. Courtesy of the artist and THIS IS NO FANTASY, Naarm Melbourne. Photo: Christian Capurro.
And He Said: This is Power? Prodigal Son is a two-channel film inspired by the 1978 Egyptian movie Return of the Prodigal Son. The work deconstructs a significant scene where a man returns home after a 12-year disappearance, confronting deep disillusionment and familial expectations. Through repetitive, silent performances, the film reimagines a conversation between father and son about the failed revolution and the decision to leave the country.
And He Said: This is Power?, Do you need to eat wasabi to get emotional?, 2022/2024 35mm slides, Kodak Ektapro slide projector. Production support: Ahmed Lesi and Mahmoud Bakar. Courtesy of the artist and THIS IS NO FANTASY, Naarm Melbourne. Photo: Christian Capurro.
A photography session in a Cairo bodybuilding gym captures Egyptian men performing traditional bodybuilding poses, then captures their expressions as they taste wasabi for the first time. As their peers watched, a dynamic of peer pressure emerged. Many men tried to hide their reactions during the shoot, revealing their true discomfort only after the camera’s gaze had shifted away. The work explores the tension between the display of power and the urge to hide vulnerability.
And He Said: This is Power?, Golden Eagle, 2024 Two-channel video projection, colour, sound 4 minutes 57 seconds, looped, Sound: Luqman Latif, 16mm film transfer and processing: Ezz Monem, lab: Artist Film Workshop, film scanning: Memory Lab Film. Courtesy of the artist and THIS IS NO FANTASY, Naarm Melbourne. Photo: Christian Capurro.
Golden Eagle is a two-channel video installation that presents a close-up of the republican eagle as it flaps on an Egyptian flag. The eagle has long symbolized power in Egypt, appearing in devotional and political artworks from the Ancient Egyptian era to the present. It also serves as a stamp of legitimacy on official governmental documents, underscoring its authoritative role in Egyptian identity.
One channel features the eagle flapping rapidly, transformed into 16mm film. In a performative intervention, a Japanese punch tool—resembling a stamp—has been used to meticulously stamp out the eagle in each frame of the film, creating an exhausting and repetitive action for nearly four hours. This painstaking process reflects a symbolic act of erasure, exhausting both physically and conceptually.
This multi-channel video project references the 1985 Egyptian film The Man Who Sneezed, released in the year I was born. The film tells the story of a man plagued by chronic sneezing, symbolizing a dance with mortality as doctors predict the end of his life. My work captures video portraits of men in the fleeting moments when they sneeze, transforming these candid encounters into high-speed videography, presented in slow motion. This technique stretches the moment of losing control over the body, emphasizing the intricate facial reactions and expressions that emerge during this involuntary act.
The work also draws on historical references, including Edison’s 1894 Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze—the first motion picture to be copyrighted—and Bas Jan Ader’s I’m Too Sad to Tell You (1971). The stretched sound of the sneezes is transmitted through an analog mixer and speaker, creating an immersive sonic presence in the center of the gallery space.
