From the Palace to the Ditch, 2021

From the Palace to the Ditch consists of a series of mainly black and white drawings on Ingres paper, which the artist bought 20 years ago in Alexandria from an Italian antique dealer and former owner of a shop for artists’ supplies. On about 40 sheets, Boghiguian deals with the history of the Suez Canal, the European interests in its construction, and the later protagonists in its operation. Its global significance became obvious to everyone once again with the Suez Canal obstruction in March 2021. Boghiguian traces back the ideas for a sea link that have existed since the 16th century: Beginning with the first concession in 1854 to the French diplomat Ferdinand de Lesseps by Egyptian governor Muhammad Said, the founding of an international Suez Canal company, via the constant political resistance of Great Britain and its occupation of Egypt in 1882, to the Convention of Constantinople in 1888, which is still valid today and guarantees all nations free passage for both merchant and warships in times of peace and war. Boghiguian investigates the Suez Canal as a canal for international trade. For example, 10% of the world trade passes through Suez today. At the beginning of the 20th century, when the British controlled the canal until 1956 they had the power to control also all the trade from East to West.

Anna Boghiguian, From the Palace to the Ditch, 2021, 41 drawings, mixed media on paper, detail

41 drawings, mixed media on paper
Installation view: IVAM, 2022
Fotos: Juan García Rosell / IVAM
Text by MGK Siegen 2022

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Anna Boghiguian

**The Square, the Line and the Ruler, 2020**

**A Short Long History, S.M.A.K., 2020**

**A Tin Drum That Has Forgotten Its Own Rhythm, 2019**

**Promenade dans l'inconscient, Carré d’Art – Musée d’art contemporain Nîmes, 2016**

**Cities by the River – Amazon, 2013–2014**

**Cities by the River – Cairo, 2013–2014**

Biography

Anna Boghiguian was born in Cairo, Egypt, in 1946 and has Armenian roots. She studied political and social science at the American University of Cairo and holds a BFA in fine arts and music from the Concordia University in Montreal, Canada. Since the early 1970s, her art has emerged from various movements around the globe, translating a nomadic experience and gaze into painting and installation, collages and books. As a traveling artist, she tells of how people and ideas, relationships and goods vary and evolve, sometimes bright and fluid, sometimes bound in inequality and oppression. Boghiguian's broad insight into literature and worlds of thought makes her art a profound source of contemplation. In 2015 Boghiguian received the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale and in 2024 she will be awarded the 30th Wolfgang-Hahn-Prize of the Society for Modern Art at the Museum Ludwig in Cologne. Her work has been featured in major solo exhibitions around the world, most recently at the Power Plant, Toronto (2023) Kunsthaus Bregenz in Venice (2022), IVAM, Valencia (2021), SMAK, Ghent (2020), Tate St. Ives (2019), the New Museum (2018) and the Museum der Moderne, Salzburg (2018) and in numerous international group shows including the 22nd Sydney Biennale (2020), Castello di Rivoli, Torino (2019), the Museum of Modern Art, New York City (2017) and the dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel (2012).

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Exhibitions at KOW