Traveling Crafts: The Moon and Science Fiction in Modern & Contemporary Middle Eastern Art
Science fiction and dystopias figure prominently in Arab literature going back more than 100 years, writes Elizabeth Rauh.
Elizabeth L. Rauh
Dr. Elizabeth Rauh is Assistant Professor of Modern Art History and Visual Cultures and Director of the Visual Arts Program at The American University in Cairo (AUC). Specializing in the history of arts and visual cultures of Iraq, Iran, and Western Asia, her work examines artist engagements with Islamic heritage, popular image practices and technologies in the Islamic world, and arts of the 1960s “Shi`i Left.” She also pursues research in ecological art practices in the history of the Persian Gulf, such as in her article “Experiments in Eden: Midcentury Artist Voyages into the Mesopotamian Marshlands” (Journal of Contemporary Iraq and the Arab World, 2021). Her research has been funded by The Academic Research Institute in Iraq, the Darat al Funun Center for Modern and Contemporary Arab Art, the Max Weber Foundation, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.