A separate place explores life as an Arab girl in Israel
Iris Hassid has spent half a decade documenting the recent surge in young Arab women choosing to study in Tel Aviv and make the city their home. The Israeli photographer, who lives around the corner from Tel Aviv University, first noticed the presence of these young women in 2012 and was amazed at the stories they had to tell.
She eventually met four of them – Samar, Aya, Majdoleen, and Saja – and started taking photos of them as they dealt with all the normal topics of young adulthood like careers and friends, but also the reality and complexities of the place they live in. Here Hassid tells us how to bring the project to life in book form.
Samar, Aya and Friend, Abba Ahimeir Street, Ramat Aviv
Aya in front of their student dormitories, Ramat Aviv
Creative Review: Tell us about your background and how you got into photography.
Iris Hassid: During my military service I enrolled in a basic photography course and did boring office work. I fell in love with her instantly and continued my photography studies while studying political science at Tel Aviv University. I later received an MFA degree from Haifa University.
I started my career as an advertising and lifestyle photographer and worked for various magazines and retail companies. From there I moved on to other photographic projects, working with various groups of young women, dealing with issues of identity, culture, representation and belonging, including one with my daughter and several of her friends, and always working with my subjects.
Road sign points to Nazareth and Kafr Kanna
Student residences from Beit Milman, Ramat Aviv
CR: Why did you decide to start your own place?
IH: I live on the street in front of Tel Aviv University, which was built on the ruins of the Palestinian village of Sheikh Munis. Like many villages in other areas, it was evacuated during the 1948 War of Independence establishing Israel. About eight years ago I noticed young Arab women students on my street and in the area. Some were religious women wearing a hijab, others were secular and recognizable because they spoke Arabic and not Hebrew. Most of them came from towns and villages in more conservative Arab communities.
The contrast between societies and places fascinated and intrigued me, especially the fact that the women looked different from what the media would normally portray them. I wanted to explore her life and find out what it means to be a young Arab woman who lives alone in the big city of Tel Aviv, away from her protective community, with all the complexities of this reality. It wasn't until I met Samar in 2014 that the project started. She was from Nazareth, a graduate of Tel Aviv University Film School and lived in my neighborhood.
Samar came to the first photo shoot with her cousin and two close friends. The resulting photo, in which they are sitting in Samar's green car, captures the happiness of the young women – they look confidently into the future. I knew then that this was the group of young women I wanted to work with. A special place follows the everyday life of Samar, her cousin Saja (psychology student), also from Nazareth; Majdoleen, Saja's roommate and Kafr Kanna architecture student; and Aya, a major in social work and gender studies from Kafr Qara.
Samar on her family property in Makhoul Village, West Galielee
CR: How has the project developed over the past six years?
IH: A few months after we met, the war in Gaza started and we were out of contact for several months. Then we met again, slowly rebuilt trust and got through difficult times in Israel – the bitter and hateful election campaign of 2015 and the Jewish nation-state law of 2018, the right-wing government and much more. The complex reality of this country kept coming in, but bit by bit I experienced more intimate parts of their lives and met their families at home.
I explored their lives through their stories and through their posts and stories on Instagram and Facebook and, with their permission, created an archive of their own images of life to get ideas about what and where to photograph. I watched them grow up, preoccupied with career, family, friends, clothes, music, and just hanging out and later graduating from college.
Majdoleen, Ramat Aviv
Majdoleen's master bedroom, Kafr Kanna
CR: What did you try to capture in the resulting images?
IH: The most important thing for me was to develop a relationship with the young women and work with them. I wanted to show them how they wanted to portray themselves: in their normal lives, in situations that are not normally portrayed by young Arab women, more western, while still clinging to much of the tradition of their Palestinian nationality.
The series moves from interiors to the street, as from its inner world to the outer world. In every picture there are hints and signs of their life. Foreground and background details and composition are very important to the way I shoot. There are recurring themes in the project – doors, windows and mirrors as metaphors of their inner and outer world; Cars and bicycles as symbols of independence, mobility and freedom; Flags, walls and olive trees as a sign of their Palestinian identity. The book also contains parts of the many conversations we have had between us over the years and shows what went on in her life and thoughts.
Samar and Louis in front of the Dizengoff Center in Tel Aviv
Samar, mother and cousins on the porch of Grandma's house, Nazareth
CR: What do you hope people will take away from the show?
IH: I want to share with others what moves and interests me, and the closeness and cooperation between me, the photographer, and the young women, the topics. I hope my project reflects our assumptions about representations and shows that we are all people with hopes and dreams who just want to be left alone to lead our lives in peace and freedom.
A place of your own can broadly be perceived as a quest for identity and self-determination in your tender early 20s, and the confusion and vulnerability of those first years of independence from home. It can be seen as a desire to belong in all aspects and a project about empowering women at an age when your friends are your family. It can also be viewed more locally as a portrait of pioneering young Arab-Palestinian women in Israel trying to bring about change in Arab and Jewish societies. Trying to fulfill and fulfill all of their dreams of freedom, career, success and more, while at the same time maintaining their Palestinian identity.
A separate location is published by Schilt Publishing; irishassidsegal.com