The SWANA Art and Poetry Event took place on October 11 at the Gillispie Gallery as a collaboration between Mason Women and Gender Studies and the Cheuse International Writers Salon Series. Poetry readings were commenced by Palestinian poet and author of You Can be the Last Leaf, Maya Abu Al Hayyat, who shared poetry in both Arabic and English. Her poetry expressed her experience, thoughts, and emotions as a refugeed mother and her forced adjustment in a context and world so different than the one she had been exiled from. Al Hayyat’s readings were followed by beautiful and moving original poetry by SWANA artists including Zeina Azzam, Danielle Badra, Zein El-Amine, Leeya Mehta and our very own associate director Holly Mason Badra. The spoken poetry touched on a variety of themes and topics including displacement, identity, memory, family, loss and intimacy.
The Event featured the calligraphic work of Mason’s School of Art 2022 Artist-in-Residence, Abdulrahman Naanseh during his exhibit, Pressure, Movement, Effect that will be open until October 15th.
