Ron Benner - Works on Palestine - EMBASSY CULTURAL HOUSE

RON BENNER: Works on Palestine

Bab Al Yaffa/The Door To Jaffa, 1988/90

The Door To Jaffa, 1988/90, Mixed media photographic installation.
Photo credit: John Tamblyn

Ron Benner, May 31, 2021

During the winter of 1988/89 cardboard boxes of oranges I had never seen before began arriving at the Covent Garden Market in London, Ontario. The only words in English on the boxes were GAZA HOPE and GOOD EARTH CITRUS. All other information was in Arabic. There was no country of origin. Oranges from Israel (JAFFA), California, Florida and Egypt were also arriving. Countries of origin were identified.

I began to collect the boxes. I remembered that the city of Jaffa, Palestine was once the largest exporter of Sharmuti oranges in the Eastern Mediterranean. It is now a suburb of Tel Aviv, Israel. The Gaza Strip is the present day location of the majority of Palestinian refugees who once lived in Jaffa and other cities and towns on the coast of what became Israel in 1948.

Icollected historical images of the Jaffa orange trade prior to 1948 and an image of the Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem taken by Jamelie Hassan in 1990. I began to consume the oranges from Gaza and save the peels. Geard Stone in London, Ontario, replicated the key or head stone above the Jaffa Gate. Mr. Antone, the First Nation stone carver, said that it was "the rope of hope", without knowing what I was working on.

I collected sandstone blocks and fragments from Geard Stone and a broken alarm clock set at 7:48 PM. The title of the installation: Bab Al Yaffa/ The Door To Jaffa. I showed it for the first time in a group exhibition, The Salvage Paradigm, curated by Janice Gurney in September, 1990 at Wynick Tuck Gallery, Toronto, Ontario.

In March 1992 I visited and photographed the Gaza Hope orange packing plant in Gaza, Palestine. I returned one of their boxes I had carried with me from Canada.

I am still hoping for their oranges to arrive in Canada 30 years later.

Trans/mission: Wednesday, May 19, 2021

Ron Benner, Trans/mission: Wednesday, May 19, 2021.

Digital Print with The Globe And Mail opinion essay by former Canadian Ambassador to Israel Jon Allen. Cochineal and lime juice on Arches paper, mortar and pestle, pencil, Mexican stencils, ruler and other tools.

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