SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The aim of this article is to show how, during times of political unrest, a work of art can become a site of contestation and negotiation. When this occurs, meaning is produced, reproduced, interpreted, encoded, and aligned with contemporary systems of representation. The work of art is the most potent example of objectified entanglement in that it occupies a physical or virtual space where the convergence of perspectives is visible and externalised. This article is inspired by a highly publicised incident of purported censorship that took place shortly after the latest war on Gaza began on October 7, 2023. Al Moulatham (2012), an anonymous portrait by Lebanese artist Ayman Baalbaki, was removed from an auction of modern and contemporary Middle Eastern art, sparking debates about censorship and the political nature of the work of art. Drawing on the work of Jacques Rancière and Gabriel Rockhill, this article looks beyond the ontologically inscribed political nature of the work of art to consider instead how sociohistorical processes of collective meaning production entangled Al Moulatham inadvertently in a political moment for which it was not originally intended.