MYRIAM BOULOS

What’s Ours

November, 2024

Myriam Boulous

“Who does the revolution belong to? What do we own if not our bodies? What is ours?”, writes Mona Eltahawy in Myriam Boulos’ debut photobook What’s Ours, published by Aperture in 2023.

What’s Ours traces a decade of Lebanon’s turbulent landscape. Born shortly after Lebanon’s last civil war, Myriam Boulos began photographing at the age of 16 as a form of activist survival mechanism—to questionBeirut, its people, and her place among them.

From the 2019 revolution and the aftermath of the Beirut port explosion the following year, to the lead-up to Israel’s ongoing attacks, Boulos’ friends, family, and fellow citizens are portrayed with intense energy and intimacy. In states of both pleasure and protest, through the haze of tear gas and political corruption, ademonstrative lust for life and freedom are revealed.

In her first exhibition in Norway she presents a selection of images, diary entries, and conversation fragments from 2013 to 2023, taken from her debut book published in 2023.

ABOUT THE ARTIST:

Myriam Boulous (b. 1992) completed her master’s degree in photography at the Lebanese Academy of Fine Arts (ALBA) in 2015. She has participated in both national and international group exhibitions and is the co-founder and photo editor of Al Hayya, a bilingual magazine that amplifies the artistic and literary work, activism, and struggles of women in the Middle East. In 2021 she joined the Magnum photo agency, and in 2023 she was awarded the W. Eugene Smith Fellowship.

Myriam Boulous