LA VI(LL)E NOUVELLE

This personal series of family photos looks for the images that form an Israeli-Morrocan peripheral identity. Protesting the depth of the stigma, I reclaim the degrading images of the Ars and Freha, presenting Mizrahi people as vulgar, inferior, and uncivilized. While I seek the Mizrahi features, my family is not occupied with the external gaze trying to define or tell their story. I use my camera to ask – Am I the one stranded in the binary us and them? Does the academic discourse keep me captivated in irrelevant stereotypes? The photos reflect the gap between the tempting imagery of the periphery and the actual selves of my subjects. The images' strength lies in this apparent gap and the story it tells about falling into racist stereotypes holding us back from freely living our lives.