Ariella Aïsha Azoulay Premieres Film on Jewish Muslim World at Paris Decolonial Festival
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay's film, 'One Thousand and One Jewels – Unlearning Imperial Plunder III,' is set to debut on May 21 at the Decolonial Film Festival in Paris. A professor at Brown University, Azoulay delves into themes of imperial violence and the legacies of colonialism. Her publication, 'Jewelers of the Ummah,' highlights the intertwined heritage of Jews and Muslims across North Africa and the Middle East. She contends that technologies of empire have led to the dispossession of colonized peoples. In February, she released 'Golden Threads,' a children's book that reinterprets colonial images. Azoulay also leads workshops where descendants recreate jewelry and share narratives, which are featured in her film alongside a map of Algiers's lost Jewish Muslim craftmaking district.
Key facts
- Ariella Aïsha Azoulay's film 'One Thousand and One Jewels – Unlearning Imperial Plunder III' premieres 21 May at the Decolonial Film Festival in Paris
- Azoulay is professor of modern culture and media at Brown University in Providence
- She published 'Jewelers of the Ummah: A Potential History of the Jewish Muslim World' in 2023
- Her first children's book 'Golden Threads' was published in February 2025
- Azoulay's 2008 book 'The Civil Contract of Photography' rethinks photography as relational
- She identifies as an Arab Jew of Algerian origins
- Azoulay argues imperial technologies like photography and childhood invention dispossess colonized groups
- She conducts 'Fabrication & Narration' workshops to reclaim jewellery-making knowledge
Entities
Artists
- Ariella Aïsha Azoulay
- Ghassan Kanafani
- Donald Trump
- Ta-Nehisi Coates
Institutions
- Brown University
- ArtReview
- Decolonial Film Festival
Locations
- Paris
- France
- Providence
- United States
- Algiers
- Algeria
- Maghreb
- North Africa
- Middle East
- Central Asia
- Palestine
- Gaza
- Fes
- Morocco
- Andalusia
- Spain