Ylara Esau Salie

VIRTUAL TOUR

ARTIST CATALOGUE

Palimpsest of a People

Palimpsest of a People unfolds as a meditation on memory, resilience, and the traces that remain when lives and histories are threatened. The exhibition brings together five interwoven works, each reflecting fragility, endurance, and the ethical weight of witnessing. Rooted in my South African perspective, the installation resonates with histories of displacement and oppression, drawing connection and solidarity with the Palestinian people, whose lives, culture, and stories are under constant threat. 

Observing is never neutral. Witnessing carries consequence, and memory becomes a form of resistance. Index presents 921 wax dolls, each hand-stitched with fragments of the Palestinian tatreez. Each stitch preserves presence, absence, and care. The numbering transforms intimate labor into a collective archive, honoring the persistence of culture and identity. Through the embroidery, the endurance of Palestinian memory and creativity is celebrated, affirming life in the face of erasure. Undercurrents shifts to monumentality with a steel sculpture of a giant keffiyeh. Its folds and scale embody resilience and identity. Every contour recalls labor, courage, and the everyday resistance of people living under oppression. The sculpture demands recognition of what is sustained, what is threatened, and what endures. Impressions in Wax witnesses the deliberate destruction of form and memory. Sculptures melt slowly, each droplet monumental, each shift a quiet testament to erasure. The video situates viewers as observers whose gaze carries responsibility. The view counts confronts the ethical tension of watching, reminding us that bearing witness without action implicates the viewer. Sound, echoing and dripping, carries the rhythm of endurance and loss, transforming observation into reflection. 

Vestiges presents wax maps of Palestine, fragile and tactile. These maps record the contours of towns, villages, and landscapes under threat, preserving memory and asserting the persistence of culture even in vulnerability. Zanana fills the space with the persistent hum of drones, transforming the gallery into an ethical environment and situating viewers within realities of surveillance, tension, and resilience. Together the works form a dialogue between memory, materiality, and politics. Wax, steel, video, and sound act as archives, witnesses, and instruments of ethical reflection. Palimpsest of a People affirms that what endures is not only memory but the responsibility to observe, remember, and carry forward histories under threat. 

The exhibition is dedicated to the people of Palestine, especially the children whose courage and resilience inspire us. I offer my deepest gratitude to my mother for her guidance, unwavering support, and motivation. I thank my partner Amaan for his tireless dedication, my father and brother for their encouragement, the videographer Salma Frans for her patience and skill, and my supervisor Fritha Langerman for her insight and guidance. Without their care, support, and presence, this work could not have been realized.