The organisation participated in Iraq’s pavilion at the 2011 Venice Biennale - only the second time the country had attended and after a 35-year absence - with a panel entitled Fluid Resilience and a film screening by Oday Rasheed, highlighting the struggles of three young artists in Baghdad’s militarised environment.
The initiative earned Sada admirers. On October 26th 2011 an auction to benefit the organisation was held at Christie’s in Dubai. The work put on sale was cutting-edge and political and was donated by six well-established Iraqi artists, amongst them Wafaa Bilal, Jananne Al-Ani and Ahmed Al Soudani, whose painting Baghdad I, sold for a record 1 million USD this year.
Proceeds from the auction have allowed Sada to continue its work and the organisation is currently working on a bilingual web platform being developed for next year, which will act as an archive for contemporary Iraqi artwork and serve as a research hub, connecting artists inside Iraq with those outside.
It’s also helped fund a series of multi-disciplinary art workshops, conducted in Arabic by internationally established artists and streamed live to students at the Iraqi Independent Film Centre in Baghdad. These are Sahakian’s pride and joy. “Artists conduct lectures from any point on the globe and students can ask questions and engage in conversation with teachers in real time,” she explains, “the software enables videos, images of works, and texts to be seamlessly presented and downloaded by students.”
This exchange illustrates the organisation’s name. “An echo measures the distance between two points through sound,” Sahakian continues. “Within Iraqi arts and culture, work, materials, archives and of course, people, are all over the globe. With Sada, we aim to connect them.” Heard clearly at home, Sada’s echo has already begun to reverberate around the world.
WHO Rijin Sahakian
WHAT Echo, a non-profit organisation supporting Iraqi artists and their works
FACT Echo is supported by New-York-based non-profit ArteEast and Dutch development organisation, the Hivos Foundation.
WHY This non-profit organisation’s mission is a noble one, namely to support the generation, presentation, and preservation of contemporary Iraqi art.
