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Ibrahim El-Salahi Untitled from Prison Notebook 1976

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A moonlike face as bright as the sun
Diffusing musk, promises, and hopes,
And the bare face of truth.

Ibrahim El-Salahi: This face shows how I used to understand people and how I thought about them. They appeared to me like a face, a moon face, very clear, very far away, aloof— but sympathetic. And that face can turn to give you another face to reality, and you are squeezed into nothingness. You become someone with no identity, not even a number.

Publication excerpt from Ibrahim El-Salahi. Prison Notebook, 1976. The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2018.
Medium
Ink on paper from a notebook with thirty-eight ink on paper drawings
Dimensions
11 1/4 × 6 3/4" (28.6 × 17.1 cm)
Credit
Acquired through the generosity of Marlene Hess and James D. Zirin, Catie and Donald Marron, Alice and Tom Tisch (in honor of Christophe Cherix), Marnie Pillsbury and Committee on Drawings and Prints Fund
Object number
319.2017.2
Copyright
© 2024 Ibrahim El-Salahi / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / DACS, London
Associated work
Prison Notebook
Department
Drawings and Prints
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