Zurich based Iranian photographer and artist Shirana Shahbazi’s 80 metre long installation, The Curve at the Barbican Art Gallery will be showing until 20th January 2008.

Location:  Barbican, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS

Link to Map 

Entrance: Free  Barbican Art Gallery Link

The Curve is an excellent piece of artwork commissioned by the Barbican and supported by Pro Helvetia, Swiss Arts Council and Stanley Thomas Johnson Foundation.

The installation, painted on the curving wall at the Barbican, is a montage of Shahabazi’s photographs and READ THE REST…

The Yacoubian Building is a novel by Alaa Al Aswany, translated by Denys Humphrey Davies and made into film by Marwan Hamed - the biggest budget ever for an Egyptian film. 

A charming friend took us to see the film at the Institute of Contemporary Arts and we fell in love with it.

See the film as soon as you can.  I cannot recommend it more strongly.

There is a fairly rubbish trailer on You Tube but we’ve brought you an interview with Alaa Al Aswany at the bottom of this article. READ THE REST…

Stephen Pook is a genius.  The clip shown here is an amazing work, crafting footage of Pakistani Sufis dancing to Qawwali music (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qawwali) for The Good the Bad and the Queen’s eponymous track on their debut album “The Good the Bad and the Queen”.

Besides the technical genius of the editing which captures the dancers’ ecstasy as the music’s bass line, brass and piano builds tempo, the video’s core is matching the visual subject to the lyrics….

“Moving uptown / but I know it’s the place I should be / the streets are all quiet / and no one saying nothing at all”

Listen to the lyrics, they make me think, they make me think about recognition:  everybody has different agendas, differing cultures but prejudice should not cloud out values.  Some may find publishing images of Sufis insulting, some may not.  What’s important is acceptance of difference and actually seeing that difference and its magic.

Send praise to Mr Pook at www.myspace.com/stephenpook and Damon Albarn and his superb band at www.thegoodthebadandthequeen.com & www.myspace.com/thegoodthebadandthequeen

Habib

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We went and tasted the delights of the first Palestinian Cafe in London, Maramia.

Maramia is at 48 Golbourne Road open from 8am to 8/9pm.  www.maramia.com

We had a superb lunch of lightly spiced traditional Palestinain grilled chicken with rice and salad, reasonable too at £7 a head.

Breakfast looks even better with the Maramia Special of eggs, falafel and vegetables.

Excellent coffee and fresh hand pressed orange juice - in fact the only orange juice we’ve tasted that’s as good as it is on the Levant.

But their signature is their fantastic sage tea - Maramia means Sage.

Clean, welcoming and quality food, what more do you need?

Habib