Oversensitivity
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ff8396b33e0522e21bd63049b7e2c57296b8d53eb9e1c6b41914149bbc2209e9/Oversensitivity-Line.jpg)
2022
Seven black and white photograms made from videos of varying length
Each image measures 4.5 in x 2.5 // 11.5 cm x 6.5 cm
In the summer of 2021, the fuel crisis that subsumed Lebanon created a cataclysmic atmosphere in which all continuity of daily life was interrupted.
It is not clear if it was the state I was in or the state Beirut was rapidly descending into, but I began to perceive the city around me differently. The best way I have been able to explain is through this experience I had multiple times throughout the summer: It is daylight. I am riding in the back of a taxi to a place I have been to many times. We take the major boulevards running through the city, they are roads I am very familiar with. We enter a tunnel, it is pitch black. We emerge from the tunnel and I have no idea where I am. I know where I am, I know where I am going, I know where I was, yet, I cannot recognize my surroundings. After a few seconds, I recover from the feeling of vertigo and I start to recognize my surroundings again.
It’s possible that rapidly moving through a pitch black tunnel to suddenly appear into the brilliant light of day was a contributing factor to my vertigo. I had the urge to start filming the experience to try and record this lapse of orientation, to see if anyone else could see what I was experiencing. But the videos do not capture what I see when I go through these tunnels. I exposed photosensitive paper to the videos I took in the tunnels so that these video sequences became single images. The blurred quality of each image and the forms they capture create a sense of movement. Forms are between the recognizable and unrecognizable, it takes a minute to orient yourself within the images, if you can at all.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7b5e67e8f7ef77a1e7ffe187adeb03eaaf3a100904e50274ad3b32d43b518c5a/july-28-2021.jpg)
27 July, 2021
20 seconds
Tunnel on General Fouad Chehab Boulevard; almost home. No conversation.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/9d8f0733d7dc30519662a082ce6fc61e8d77ab9d874940abc11b20b064a47026/july-27-2021.jpg)
28 July, 2021
29 seconds
Tunnel on General Fouad Chehab Boulevard; almost home. No conversation, wind blows through open windows.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0bee5ebb250032616bffc7a3b136b22e4d12eed31a2a149bd89f44c163bf291a/august-15-2021.jpg)
15 August, 2021
8 seconds
Tunnel on General Fouad Chehab Boulevard; almost home. The fluctuating exchange rate is discussed.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/61c2eff6b5388aff74671ede518d345af04d39c0f942a6a4bd6b84a04675624d/feb-19-2022.jpg)
19 February, 2022
4 seconds
Tunnel on Saeb Salam boulevard; going from Mathaf in the direction of downtown. No conversation, wind is especially loud.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/9662ca1708d522f6c88afc31ff6c76ae339e4001a157d5d68114b80c6e9168e3/feb-25-2022.jpg)
25 February, 2022
13 seconds
Tunnel on Charles Malek boulevard; going from Basta to Reem’s house. The taxi driver says, “We are history”, “نحن تاريخ”.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/99a87cdf42072126e23f0a41d497728563e9d3b0cc6d0b6f6b6d57f07062c316/feb-27-2022.jpg)
27 February, 2022
35 seconds
Tunnel where General De Gaulle boulevard becomes Saeb Salam; on the way to Mathaf from the sea. No conversation.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0f56f0ac460b1678eddd190d97853fe5b9587b86919eae1c66ec416c4db452fa/march-26-2022.jpg)
26 March, 2022
7 seconds
Tunnel on General Fouad Chehab in the direction of Achrafieh; going to Youmna’s house. The taxi driver says something with the word “expertise”, “خبرة”.