Searching for Appendices to Truths Lost: The Broken Sunglasses of Omar Al Mukhtar

Description:

During her residence at the collections of the former Colonial Museum sponsored by the Taking Care-Ethnographic and World Cultures Museums as Spaces of Care project co-funded by the European Union’s Creative Europe program, Malak Yacout (Missouri, 1993; lives and works in Cairo) focused on one of the collections’ most controversial object: the sunglasses most likely owned by Omar al-Mukhtar, a leader of anti-colonial Libyan resistance also known by the nickname “Desert Lion.” Yacout started from a detail of the glasses, the producer’s de- tails printed on the glasses’ leather case, which lead back to Maroun Ayac, an optician in Alexandria, Egypt.  

The artist first conducted interviews with Ayac’s descendants who continue running their father’s business, then analyzed audio recordings of statements of Sheikh Muhammad, Omar al-Mukhtar’s son, and finally spoke with Nafe’ al-Senussi, grandson of the first King of Libya, Idris al-Senussi, a member of the Senussi brotherhood that also included al-Mukhtar.  

As formalized in the artist’s book on display, Yacout’s investigation shows that these glasses were taken by Rodolfo Graziani (then deputy governor of Libya) during the interrogation that led to the Libyan leader’s hanging in Soluch outside a camp where Libyan civilians were imprisoned during the colonial period on Sept. 16, 1931. ML