Evar Hussayni is a multi-disciplinary artist and researcher. Under the umbrella of archives and the concept of ‘documentation’, Evar’s practise explores visibility, political/historical positioning, violence and its relationship with the trajectory of Kurdish feminism/ womanhood. Her practise is rooted in academic debates on Orientalism/othering, extending into a revelation of how archives and documentation can erase heritage, violate or pigeon-hole; she is interested in what inclusive archives looks like. Evar want to understand why hierarchies and mechanisms of exclusion play such a prominent role when exploring heritage and modes of documentation. Whose history is being preserved/recorded and whose history is being erased/dismissed/altered? Most recently, Evar founded @thewanawal, a publicly accessible library which looks to archive the art work and curatorial projects by womxn artists from West Asia and North Africa. Evar’s aim is to redefine + reposition the narrative by enriching/expanding the storyline concerning womxn from the specified region.

Image credit: Evar Hussayni, Women In My History Part II, 2017. Courtesy of the artist.