About
Anatomy of Revolution is an open-source ABC and Archive of Revolts and Revolutions. At its core, it is a tool for exploring the iconography and language of global, past and present resistance movements. It consolidates the vast amount of visual, written and audio material, which artist Lara Baladi gathered between 2011 and 2021, as part of her project ‘Vox Populi, Tahrir Archives,’ and uses the Arabic alphabet to organize that body of data into an abecedary, an educational primer of struggles for freedom.
Consistent with the rest of Baladi’s oeuvre, Anatomy of Revolution is a collage, a non-linear artistic narrative. The Arabic alphabet is the skeleton onto which concepts, stories and subject matter are montaged and connected to each other. The ABC invites the user to navigate the letters in any order. You can start and end anywhere, drawing your own conclusions along the way.
Each of the 28 letters has its own dedicated page under which revolution-related words are explored. Themes are wide-ranging and go beyond what one might at first associate with the topics ‘revolt,’ ‘revolution’ or ‘freedom.’ When we say that the platform is a primer of ‘struggles for freedom,’ we use this phrase in its widest possible sense. ‘Struggles for freedom’ includes emotional and personal struggles, and evokes the myriad conflicts that emerge as individuals go about trying to make and express themselves in societies. In this sense, Anatomy of Revolution is true to the idea that the ‘political’ is neither simply what relates to the functionings of government, nor just a reference to an intellectual field reserved for politicians, activists and ivory tower dwelling academics: the ‘political’ is pervasive, and plays out in everything we do and every interaction we have.
The objectives of Anatomy of Revolution are twofold: to preserve a digital cultural heritage at risk of becoming irretrievable as it falls to the bottom of the Google search engine, and to prompt creative engagement with the ABC’s content. In this spirit, exhibitions, workshops and seminars drawing on that content will take place periodically. Also in line with the goal of fostering engagement, The Anatomist, a bi-annual publication, is being launched alongside the platform, each edition of which will focus on a specific letter or theme from the ABC.
In its current form, Anatomy of Revolution is functional and navigable. However, text copy edits are yet to be implemented, and the ‘Find More’ button is yet to be activated. The latter will lead to complementary information to the visual narrative: a selection of articles from the Vox Populi, Tahrir Archives, and outcomes of future workshops and seminars.
Please get in touch should you be interested in contributing to the ‘Find More’ archive, The Anatomist publication, or in any other creative way.
We thank you for being our first users.
– The Anatomy team
Acknowledgements
Anatomy of Revolution is an ongoing project by Lara Baladi, started in 2019.
| Artistic Direction and UX (User Experience) | |
|---|---|
| Lara Baladi | |
| Software Architect & Developer | UI (User Interface) |
| Husamuddin Hamad | Gaber Mohamed |
| Graphic Design | Image Credits Research |
| Lead graphic designer: Jana Kibbi | Habiba Haddara |
| Mariam Diab | Farah Michel |
| Mohamed Gaber | Batool Nader Ali |
| Siwar Kraytem | Daniella Nemeh |
| Yara Youssef | Smarika Sharma |
| Commissioned Artists | Contributing Artists |
| Zeyad Ayman | Ryan Aasen |
| Eric Bush | Essam Attia |
| Mustafa El Fake & Mahmoud El Masry | Fierce Pussy (Joy Episalla and Carrie Yamaoka) |
| Sherief El Katsha | Mohamed Gaber |
| Ganzeer | |
| Aaron Hughes (Autonomous Democracy) | |
| Marisa Jahn | |
| Bassem Yousry | |
| Copy Editor (in progress) | |
| Zacharia Fahmi | |
The artist wishes to extend her gratitude to the following people for their support and contribution in the very early stage of the project: Selma Abu El Dahab, Mai Ayyad, Diego Calvo Cubero, Luis Lloréns Pendas, and Cynthia Madansky.
Anatomy of Revolution has been made possible thanks to the support from AFAC (Arab Fund for Art and Culture), MIT Open Documentary Lab, Arts at MIT, the Ford Foundation, The Bohen Foundation, and the British Council’s Digital Innovation (Arts) and Cultural Engagement Program.
Copyright Disclaimer
Every effort has been made to acknowledge the copyrights of images on this site. We apologize for any infringement where copyright has proved difficult to trace. Please get in touch if you would like to provide information about or request the removal of an image.