At Ibraaz in London, Gabrielle Goliath’s Elegy is on show until 17 January 2027. In the work, one woman after another rises to sing a single mournful note. Each voice ends when her breath does, and another takes its place.
The piece was meant for the South African pavilion at the Venice Biennale. In January, Gayton McKenzie, South Africa’s sport, arts and culture minister, cancelled Goliath’s participation and described the inclusion of a commemoration to the Palestinian poet Hiba Abu Nada as “divisive”.
Goliath made Elegy as part of a performance and video series she has developed for more than a decade. The version prepared for the biennial addressed rape culture in South Africa, femicide and the murder of LGBTQ+ people there, the Herero and Nama genocide in Namibia in the early part of the 20th century, and Abu Nada’s death.
Ibraaz and the social justice charity the Bertha Foundation arranged another Venice presentation at the Chiesa di Sant’Antonin. Elegy ran there from the biennial’s opening in May until the end of July.
Abu Nada was a Palestinian poet killed in an Israeli airstrike in October 2023. Heba Kamal Abu Nada was 32 years old and studied biochemistry at the Islamic University of Gaza. In 2017, Heba Abu Nada received the Sharjah Prize for Arab Creativity in the novel category for El oxígeno no es para los muertos.
One day before she was killed, Hiba Abu Nada shared: “If we die, know that we are satisfied and firm, and tell the world, in our name, that we are just people on the side of truth”.
At Ibraaz, Goliath’s work is shown alongside Joe Namy’s sound installation Cosmic Breath (2023/26). Namy’s installation uses ten megaphones to play the adhan, or call to prayer. It was commissioned by the Islamic Arts Biennale in Jeddah in 2023 and has not been shown since.
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