BREMEN.- when was the last time you daydreamed is Majd Abdel Hamid’s first institutional solo exhibition in Germany. Hamid presents embroidery and fabric works that condense—or dissolve—thought and memory processes. In the back-and-forth of the thread, he recalls and forms relationships with the world, even potential worlds. This is also the second exhibition in our series for fear of continuity problems, which explores the notion of memory in parts of GAK’s indoor space and in the poster frames outside.
For many years, embroidery has been central to Majd Abdel Hamid’s practice that he pursues as a continuous, diary-like process. He draws on Tatreetz, the traditional form of Palestinian embroidery, without focusing on the symbolism and perfection. While initially Hamid’s work involved transferring and repeating media images, pixels of which he incorporated into his cross-stitch patterns, his pieces are now mostly abstract. The slow, back-and-forth motion of the cross-stitch creates formations, notations, and cartographies that tactilely accompany, image, and continue thoughts and memories.
In his exhibition at GAK, embroideries in white are displayed outdoors in the poster frames, revealing their motifs only upon close inspection and through the play of shadow and texture. The works are both understated and intense, defying the logic of fleeting glances and the hyper-presence of images: no colors, no readily apparent forms, but rather an invitation to take one’s time—much like Hamid does in his own working process. Only then do the embroideries reveal the paths taken by the needle, and with it, by thought.
The three series of works in the indoor space are based on small scraps of fabric. Carefully removed threads create fragile images of loss, but also of openness, revealing other patterns within the weave and design. Hamid then embroiders the reclaimed threads to form small circles on paper. The resulting works are reminiscent of codes, punch cards, and automated looms, yet they resist binary, either-or logic and easy interpretation. Hamid’s cards carry instead concentrated information; their multitude of threads wait to be read in a much more open way. In one corner of the room, a thousand fabric “fortune tellers” are piled high, much like the candies in Félix González-Torres’s work. Hamid also invites visitors to take one of these little finger games. Usually, they predict the future using predetermined possibilities, but here they are an invitation to a tactile exploration to imagine and to daydream.
The exhibition title when was the last time you daydreamed refers to an interview with the Syrian opposition leader Riad al-Turk, who spoke of creating daily drawings while in prison, using only his bedsheet and the lentils he had retrieved from his soup. Every evening he had to destroy the drawing before going to sleep, but the next day he would begin anew. It was a way to prevent himself from indulging in daydreams, which would have so clearly revealed the impossibility of connecting with the world. Hamid, on the other hand, seeks connection to the world precisely through daydreaming, which he sees as a means of potentiality, reflection, and imagination. In his embroidery and textile works, he explores the openness and incompleteness of memory, of knowledge, and of the future within the repetitions of the everyday. The slow, manual work that resists automation and acceleration, whether in the density of the embroidery or the dissolution of the textile, is a way of thinking as well as remembering and relating to the world.
