Sarah Farahat and Alexandria Saleem

Unceeded land of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, Siletz, and Warm Springs, and specifically the Cowlitz, Chinook, Multnomah, Kalapuya, Tualatin, Clackamas, and many more tribes that call this land home.

Teta’s Tea

DESCRIPTION

Join cultural workers Alexandria Saleem and Sarah Farahat to steep in Teta’s tea. This is an invitation to grieve, nourish, and connect with what has been passed down through love and lineage, while remembering to cultivate new futures. The Earth’s rumblings and burnings make way for altered visioning and regrowth during times when our creativity is crushed under the weight of occupation, exploitation, and greed. The artists take revolutionary inspiration from orcas and wasps, kite makers and clowns.

This indoor/outdoor event is designed to nourish folks in the SWANA (Southwest Asia and North Africa) diaspora as well as highlight fundraising efforts for families from Gaza hosted by Flowers for Palestine. Portland-based band Seffarine offers vibrant original music deeply rooted in Morocco's musical collision between Arabic, Iberian and West African cultures. Join in traditional Gazan kite making for the traveling exhibition Targeted: 100+ Kites: A Benefit for Gaza with Mohammed Usrof and Bint Bandora. Enjoy regional eats from local vendors and a selection of visionary SWANA films curated by Sahar al-Sawaf, all served with a side of Teta's tea.

People of all ages and backgrounds are welcome. Bring your own sheesha!

Vendors

The Vegan Syrian (@vegansyrianpdx)

Sweet Treats by Nariman

Shereen’s Cuisine شرين

Schedule

6:00 - 7:00 PM: Gazan Kite Making with Mohammed Usrof and Bint Bandora 

 7:15 - 8:00 PM: Music by Seffarine  

 8:00 - 9:00 PM: Outdoor gathering time with tunes curated by the Seamstress of Sound 

 6:00 - 7:00 PM, 8:00 - 9:00 PM: SWANA short films, curated by Sahar al-Sawaf (@salsawaffles):

The Place That is Ours, directed by Zena Agha and Dorothy Allen-Pickard (@dorothyallenpickard)

Ana Min Wein?, directed by Nouf Aljowaysir (@nouf.py)

Friday, directed by Aisha Amin (@aisha____amin)

Egypt, You Made Me Love You, directed by Tara Bayat (@tbayt)

Badrya, directed by Asmahan Bkerat (@asmahan_bkerat), Ban Maraqa, and Doaa Nassar

How My Grandmother Became a Chair, directed by Nicolas Fattouh (@nicolas_fattouh)

The Blue Star, directed by Valentin Noujaïm (@vnoujaim)

Night, directed by Ahmad Saleh (@the_ahmadsaleh)

Echolocation, directed by Nadia Shihab (@nadiashihab)

Mama’s Fatteh, directed by Alia Carita Tompkins (@aliacarita) and Nasma Kublawi (@nasmakublawi)

Ba’ali, directed by Deemah Dabis (@deemah.dabis)

The Landmarks of Memory, directed by Christina Hajjar (@garbagebagprincess)

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Sarah Farahat is a transdisciplinary Egyptian American* artist, cultural worker, teacher, and abolitionist dreaming of a more collective future for all beings. She holds a BA in Psychology from Occidental College, a BFA in Intermedia Studies from PNCA, and an MFA from California College of the Arts. She has trained in auricular acupuncture at the historic Lincoln Recovery Center in The Bronx, and participated in Beirut's Homeworkspace program on the coattails of the Arab "Spring." She teaches art at local colleges and for kids in her community, and is a member of the Justseeds Artists' Cooperative. For the past 16 years, Farahat has monitored the body within the sociopolitical landscape in the US and abroad, intervening with works that explore grief, connection, assimilation, storytelling, and engagement. Grassroots movement building informs her work. She finds joy in reading speculative fiction, talking with plants, cooking, and DJing. Her work lives in protests, archives, public and digital spaces, and is in the permanent collections of JustSeeds Collective, Pittsburgh; Arab American National Museum, Dearborn; Charles Voorhies Fine Art Library, Portland; Palestine Poster Project, Silver Spring; and the Center for the Study of Political Graphics, Culver City. She has been featured in publications including Artforum, The Oregonian, L'Orient-Le Jour, and The Daily Star. As a nomadic child of diaspora, Farahat plants portals through taste, smell, and sound while continually attempting to live in reciprocity with the land wherever she creates home. She is a co-founder of the SWANA Rose Culture and Community Center in Portland.

Alexandria Rema Saleem is a first generation Palestinian American* artist and cultural worker. She works with individuals, communities, and the land to reclaim our right to sacred spaces through land tending, worldbuilding, dance, ritual, risk, and tenderness. Flowers are her deepest ally and main medium, working between the land as a regenerative flower farmer and her community as florist, event designer, and installation artist. She is currently co-stewarding the Black Oregon Land Trust and is the Director of Arts and Culture with the Center for Study and Preservation of Palestine. 

*The artists grapple with an appropriate way to name their locations amidst the ongoing legacies of harm to land and people by colonialist projects.

Farahat and Saleem are two of the co-founders of the SWANA Rose Culture and Community Center.