Download the Education and Accessibility Guide for SCREEN MEMORIES
MONA BENYAMIN: MOONSCAPE
Curated by May Makki
Filmmaker Mona Benyamin draws on popular media forms in order to frame intergenerational perspectives on trauma and hope. Taking the form of a music video, Moonscape follows the artist’s query to the Lunar Embassy seeking citizenship that would allow her travel to neighboring Arab countries as a Palestinian with an Israeli passport.
Among Benyamin’s direct references are film noir, Arabic music videos from the 1990s such as Amarna by Ehab Tawfik, and Sabah Fakhri’s performance of Jar El Amar on Orbit TV. In Arabic, amar is the word for moon, but also a common term of endearment to express “my love.” Layering cinematic and popular references, Moonscape frames the artist’s isolation from other Arab countries as a tragic tale of unrequited love.
MONA BENYAMIN: MOONSCAPE is presented as part of SCREEN MEMORIES, a two-venue exhibition presented at Cuchifritos Gallery + Project Space through April 12, 2025 and Abrons Arts Center through April 14, 2025.
SCREEN MEMORIES considers the experience of mass media in the Arab world for a generation of artists who grew up in the early 2000s, at the tail end of network television’s popularity. Using video and sound, artists Yara Asmar, Mona Benyamin, and Huda Takriti reference and reimagine the media they grew up with in new forms.
The term “screen memory,” originally coined by Sigmund Freud, refers to the creation of a “screen” to mask an unpleasant childhood memory. This exhibition uses the term as a jumping-off point: the artists draw on visual culture and media moments that they encountered on screen, including the Gulf Wars, popular children’s shows such as Mini Studio, and news coverage of the Second Intifada. Playing with nostalgia but insisting on resonance with the present, these works surface the interplay between broadcast media and psychological experience.
SCREEN MEMORIES is curated by May Makki, Abrons Arts Center’s 2024-25 Curatorial AIRspace Resident, and presented in partnership by Artists Alliance Inc and Abrons Arts Center.
Image: Mona Benyamin, Moonscape, 2020 (Still), Courtesy of the artist.
Yara Asmar is a musician and video artist based in Beirut, Lebanon. Her music has been described as “Strange, adventurous, elongated and highly idiosyncratic” by Cyclic Defrost‘s Bob Baker Fish. Her video works include i like it better when we lived on see-saw hill, clocks for dinner, and Mr. Samuel’s Teatime Stories (For Good Kids & Confused Adults) and often incorporate puppetry and music. Her album Synth Waltzes and Accordian Laments was included in Pitchfork’s roundup of 30 Best Jazz and Experimental Albums of 2023. In addition to touring internationally, she is a regular resident on Radio Alhara.
Mona Benyamin is a visual artist, filmmaker, and writer based in Palestine. In her works, she explores intergenerational outlooks on hope, trauma, and different temporalities. Through appropriating formats from mass and popular media and tampering with their apparatuses, and utilizing dark humor, she questions notions of authenticity and veracity, and challenges concepts of agency and victimhood. Her recent works have been screened — among others — at the Museum of Modern Art, REDCAT, Sheffield DocFest, The Mosaic Rooms, and Columbia University.
May Makki is a New York-based curator specializing in contemporary art and performance. Her work focuses on media, the politics of cultural memory, and emergent aesthetics. She has organized exhibitions, performances, and discursive events at venues such as the Museum of Modern Art, 99 Canal, Sweet Pass Sculpture Park, and Spectacle. She holds an MA from the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College.
Huda Takriti superimposes personal and national narratives in her video works and her image-text or text-text collages, aiming to spotlight gaps in historical and national memory. She is currently pursuing a PhD in practice at the Academy of Fine Art in Vienna, where she is examining the notion of archival erasure relating to the (hi)stories of female freedom fighters from the Middle East in times of armed anti-colonial struggle. Questioning the construction and production of historical narratives, as well as the potential that contamination can carry as a way for surviving archival gaps. She completed her master’s studies at the TransArts department at the University of Applied Arts Vienna in 2020. She also completed her bachelor’s degree at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Damascus, Syria, in 2012. Her work has been awarded several scholarships and prizes, including the Vordemberge-Gildewart Award (2022), the Kunsthalle Wien Prize (2020), and the Camargo Foundation Fellowship (2023), among others.
Accessibility
During your visit, if desired, a folding chair can be provided should standing for short or long periods of time interfere with your viewing experience. Additionally, sound-dampening headphones and tinted glasses are available and will be provided upon request for visitors for whom the sound or lighting of the gallery space is disruptive. Baby strollers are welcome in Essex Market and Cuchifritos Gallery + Project Space. Both facilities are wheelchair accessible, and service animals on a leash are permitted.
If you have questions about accessing Cuchifritos Gallery or attending programs, please email gallery@artistsallianceinc.org.
Our Funders
Artists Alliance Inc. (AAI) is a 501c3 not-for-profit organization located on the Lower East Side of New York City. Programming support is provided by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council and public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with support from the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature. Further exhibition programming is made possible by the National Endowment for the Arts. We thank the New York City Economic Development Corporation, The Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural & Educational Center, and individual supporters of Artists Alliance Inc for their continued support. Special thanks go to our team of dedicated volunteers and interns, without whom this program would not be possible.