Wael Shawky brings the drama to Los Angeles

Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles is presenting the US premiere of Wael Shawky's film installation Drama 1882. Shawky debuted his installation in the Egyptian Pavilion at the 2024 Venice Biennale, where it attracted great attention. The artist, who frequently turns to the past for his subject matter, took inspiration for Drama 1882 from the populist Urabi revolution in Egypt (1879-1882), an uprising which sought to remove the grip that European imperialism had on the country.

Originally staged as a musical play, Shawky rendered Drama 1882 as a cinematic opera divided into eight parts which plays out on a stage with candy-colored sets serving as a backdrop to the historical drama that unfolds. The visuals are marked by a surreal flow, as European ambassadors squat barefoot during negotiations about the fate of the Middle East while dancing girls seductively entice drunkards in taverns. The whole ensemble lends an Andersonian air to the historical narrative, while the artist's employment of unmasked actors represents a break from his usual practice. All of this “conjures a sense of entertainment, of catastrophe, and our inherent doubt in history,” as the author states.

Using extensive historical research, Shawky grapples with the concepts of national, religious and artistic identity through film, performance and unorthodox narrative techniques, scrutinizing the purported reason that the British used as justification for their bombardment of Alexandria and the seven decades of colonial rule that followed. The artist arranged the choreography, the score, and wrote and directed the piece, which is performed in Classical Arabic. Shawky deemed the subject of his opera relevant to the theme of the Venice Biennale, “Foreigners Everywhere,” flipping the European perspective on the influx of immigrants onto the continent, reflecting on the antagonistic role that they had as occupiers in Egypt.

Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles has organized the premiere of Drama 1882 as part of Wonmi's WAREHOUSE Programs. The installation is on view at WAREHOUSE at the Geffen Contemporary in MOCA LA through March 16, 2025. More on this and other exhibitions at MOCA LA can be found on their site.