Überfremdung is a word used by frightened citizens who fear for their German identity.
I stand in opposition, and just as I am sharpening my arguments, a friend of mine tells me she’s received a death threat from one of the dealers.
I look out the window and see raids and arrests. I see desperate, traumatized African men staggering around everywhere. Many are without a safe place to stay and sleep in the park at night. I see mothers, relaxed on the playground with their little children. I hear the enlightened, well-educated fathers talking about the security-problem for their wives and children, as they lie in the sun and inhale deeply.
The guy from Guinea still has the best stuff.

“He had found this picture in an envelope inside a hotel room. There was also a small piece of paper, it had been teared and the meaning got lost. It was sad in a way because the handwriting talked about memory. Something about being able to look through the window and see beyond our own reflections. He glanced at his face in the mirror and wondered if he had ever met the person who wrote this. They had both stayed in the same place after all. Only at a different time.”

During the lockdown, I took several photographs of portraits, plants and abstract shapes with a pinhole camera. I assembled them in this composition and then I imagined the small story above from what it evoked for me.

The first step to make the transition to a more beautiful world is to recognize the opportunity for reinvention. Let’s break down boundaries and co-create a different system. Ultimately we need to change the narrative.

Coclick, colike, coexist.

This is an interpretation of a painting called “The Dance”, by Henri Matisse, created in 1910. This piece was created one day before WHO has officially declared the outbreak of COVID-19 a pandemic. Therefore, the whole situation has had a small influence on the final result of the image. Nevertheless, this illustration isn’t necessarily related to it, and primarily was intended to go further beyond this issue. It’s mainly about the some common struggle of young generations and the generation of millennials going through life and facing the uncertain future. But most importantly this is a picture representing collaboration as a main tool of solving any kind of problems we face.

The Tokyo Skytree operates as a broadcasting tower for the Kantō Region. It replaced the Tokyo Tower due to the vast increase in development and high-rise buildings. With it also being the tallest tower in the world it can be seen to represent the exponential urbanisation absorbing our planet. Tokyo is the largest and most densely populated city I’ve visited but despite its size, everything runs extremely efficiently. It is a place where humans coexist with incredible balance with each other. A balance that is increasingly lost between the city and surrounding nature.

Language and how we address and talk to others are crucial. A lot of the time people use certain phrases or words to praise or complement someone but in actuality they’re being racist, exclusive and inconsiderate. For example in Egypt, people might use phrases like “Christian but kind,” “dark-skinned but beautiful,” “low class but smart,” etc. while being completely unaware of how offensive they are.

The posters highlight the word “but” in Arabic because it’s the common problem with all the collected phrases. “buts” can appear healthy and shiny but really they’re rotten and ugly. The phrases can coexist without any “buts.”

but. posters were created in a workshop instructed by @engyakamel

No matter where we are, how we named or which era we are in, at the end we are all humans living under the same stars.

How much easier would it be for humans if all they needed to coexist was a recipe from a cookbook. A lost treasure to uncover and serve on a plate? I doubt that this is something we can find but I tried to write my own version of it.

I mainly draw. I have been trying to design/make something regularly, since the lock-down. The first three posters are explorations of a pattern, led by and to go with the Aristotle quote. I had not worked with patterns before, and it was quite an exercise! The poster with the most detail came of the shock that the graph in it caused me. I am fortunate to have come across this delightful haiku in my life, and more so, to pass it on. I have digitized an old unused illustration of mine and made a layout with it. As ever, I cease to be once the art is displayed and it’s just you so, nothing on what they mean or represent. I hope the works speak clearly and appeal to you in some way.

Where ever we live in this world, we are connecting and we are together.

This piece was born out of pain and anger from the tragic murders of countless black men and women in the United States. Systemic racism must end. Enough is Enough!

Sometimes facts and words speak to us more clearly than they usually do.
Here, on Earth, we all live together and in these unprecedented times we probably have to speak to each other more clearly and properly than we used to do.
It’s all about our own differences and identities and the importance of solidarity.
Our call, now, is to find new ways to co-exist.

Design: Nom de Plume, nomdeplume.it
Font: Union, radimpesko.com

people of the world unite!

This drawing evokes the need to recreate a link with others and nature. The plurality of worlds, perceived as so many local singularities and small communities, seems to be connected by a global consciousness, a cosmos whose breath crosses the whole of the living.

194 stars, one for every nation, surround a central dot, representing our world.
Despite all stars being different from another they share many similarities underlining the idea, that with open mindedness we can bridge the gaps between us–or at least respect each other.
By using the iconography of a flag we get an emotional symbol to rally under.