The most comprehensive book yet about the Egyptian-German artist Susan Hefuna was developed in the course of a close dialogue with the editor, Hans Ulrich Obrist. Hefuna has been working in the media of drawing, photography, installation and video since the early 1990s. She uses these various techniques to intertwine levels of meaning and reflect many-layered codes, which she interprets in both concrete and abstract manners.
Pars Pro Toto presents numerous new works by the versatile artist: Mashrabiya screens, vitrines on the streets of Cairo, masks, fabric works and drawings. Photographs give the reader a first glimpse of Hefuna's working process. Many of the Cairo works were created in workshops, on the street, or in private homes. Cairo thus functions in a way as studio, as laboratory. From these recent works, the book traces an arc back to earlier video works by the artist.
The interviews conducted by Hans Ulrich Obrist with Susan Hefuna and Sudanese author Tayeb Salih are supplemented with poems by the world-famous Syrian poet Adonis.

HUO: Let's talk about those architectural influences? In the literature about your works there is always mention of the Islamic woodwork from the urban areas of Cairo, which oscillates between visibility and invisibility.

SH: Mashrabiya.

HUO: Right, it's all about the seeing and the not seeing: what I see, what sees me, what I don't see and so on.

Editor: Hans Ulrich Obrist
Authors: Adonis, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Tayeb Salih
Artists: Susan Hefuna

Flexcover
24 x 28,5 cm
256 pages
88 color ills.
English/Arabic
available
ISBN 978-3-939583-76-9
58 Euro
2008