Steve Sabella – Photography 1997-2014
By Hubertus Von Amelunxen
2014
Between 1997 and 2003 Sabella photographed three series, Search (1997), Identity (2002), and End of Days (2003): from the alienated impression of black-and-white nature, the walling in of things in Search, to the colorful expanses of the landscape, the deserts, cliffs, and furrowed fields in Identity and to the opening to abstraction initiated through a reversal of the light in End of Days. “To be a work means to set up a world,” Heidegger writes, and this building and unbuilding accompany Sabella’s work.
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Steve Sabella – I am From Jerusalem
Exhibition Catalogue – The Empty Quarter Gallery, Dubai
By Christa Paula
It has been noted that, in contrast to the older generation of Palestinian artists, the young contemporaries have opted to avoid the pitfalls of overtly political image production. Sabella’s first three series (Search 1997, Identity 2002, End of Days 2003) do not show Jerusalem. Instead they steer the viewer into depopulated landscapes beyond its city walls, offering glimpses of harsh beauty and superficially integrated alien objects. Light, in different spectra, is significant and is utilized to create an imaginary reality, a promise of relief in a world beyond the visible.