Halim Ramses is an artist based in Cairo, Egypt. Halim focuses on the notion of “gathering” as an act in itself. Thinking of gathering as a form, an ephemeral moment yet an embodied affect. Through his practice he incorporates different mediums including participatory performances, tours, workshops, story-telling and spell making sessions. Halim’s residency is supported by the Prince Claus Foundation.
In Every Step, A Seed: City Walks, Passion Fruit & The Making of Us
Essay on Halim Ramses’ 32° East Residency
by Tim Agaba Baroraho
PART I: A Response to Halim Ramses’ ‘An Invitation’
“in this smoking chaos, our shoulder blades kissed/i found you/i found you beautiful/i found you exploding”
–kyle “guante” tran myhre
what if we could decide how we measured time? what if we could gather in one place and bring all of our different
homes with us? what if we felt our way to new customs for how we treated one another? what if we didn’t have to wait?
*
you hear the echoes of screams from hours spent doom scrolling as you go try to fall asleep. you turn your head left and
right, hoping to drown out the sound. there is the dust. the numbers. there is that tightness in the pit of your belly from
being struck by having nothing to do about it and the ease with which you can move onto videos about that tv show you
like.
*
there were so many ideas you used to have about the world and what you would do to change it when you grew up. you
learnt so many big words. like colonialism. apartheid. state-sanctioned violence. patriarchy. systemic oppression. you
learnt that there isn’t a magic wand. not even a silver bullet. that this was by design. this was intentional. you felt yourself
floating. longing to escape.
*
in your dreams, you turn doorknobs that refuse to open. you have all of this grief but nowhere to put it. you walk down
streets filled with people who don’t have faces. speaking in a language you no longer remember.
*
on the side of the road, you catch a glimpse of who you used to be in another’s eyes. it is just dawning on him—his place in the world. the cruelty with which he has been shoved there is breaking him. he’s trying to wipe the humiliation off his face but it remains. you’re part of a group threatened by a soldier; rifle dangling off his shoulder. in clearing the road, so aggressively, he must have forgotten how dearly you hold your own lives. how capable of thinking you can be. you’re tempted to remind him. instead you look over at those familiar eyes. you want to say you’ve had the world pulled from underneath your feet too. you want to tell him that maybe this heartbreaking realisation can be the start of a kind of communing. that perhaps pain and grief for the world can be a weight you both learn to carry together. the motorcade is gone faster than you can shield your face from the dust it leaves behind.
*
here is passionfruit, let us make a clock. we can walk down the street and remember the time back home. here, hold my
hand, i’m breaking again. here is the map to my heart. find me.
PART II: Excerpts From A Conversation
>> [how] to sit and slow down time<<
>> feeling relation with no intimidation<<
>> we theorize too much and forget that it’s a lived experience<<>> swimming against the tide can be lonely and isolating<<
>> but [there is also] room for intimacy<<Tim Agaba Baroraho is a Ugandan writer and researcher whose work has centered on human rights, gender equality and criminal justice.
