In September of 1982, the Arab world was shaken to its core when a massacre unfolded in Beirut’s Sabra and Shatila refugee camps.
Over the course of three days, the bodies of the 3,600 mutilated people, primarily Palestinians, were piled up on the camp's narrow streets.
When news of the slaughter reached Dia al-Azzawi in London, the Iraqi artist known for his interpretations of war, he felt compelled to speak on behalf of those who could no longer.
Using pencils and ballpoint pens, Azzawi created a chilling mural-sized depiction of the severed bodies that were recovered from and around the camps, bringing the violence that these people had suffered to the attention of the world.
The resulting work, Sabra and Shatila, is scattered with fragmented limbs, animals, and domestic objects, encapsulating the depths of human despair that can be seen throughout post-Nakba Palestinian history.
The original drawing was acquired by the Tate in 2012, but could not be displayed permanently due to its delicate nature.
This inspired art collector Dr Ramzi Dalloul to commission Azzawi’s drawing in a woven form, taking inspiration from a process similar to Picasso’s Guernica, which had been reproduced as a tapestry by Nelson Rockefeller.
Due to its medium that can withstand the test of time, seventy years on, Rockefeller’s Guernica sits outside the UN Security Council, serving as a poignant reminder to politicians of the tragedies of war: perhaps a futile act, but a necessary one.
In 2014, Dalloul commissioned the Royal Tapestry Factory in Madrid, a facility over 300 years old, to complete the job. With the artist's permission, they spent the next four years transforming Azzawi's drawings into a monumental work of art, consisting of cotton and wool, that spans 7.5 x 3 metres.
It can be found today at the Dalloul Artist Collective in one of the many new buildings erected near Beirut port following the deadly explosion in 2020.
Alongside Azzawi’s monumental work, the exhibition features several other artists, including Ayman Baalbaki and Sliman Mansour, in Testimonies of Fire.
Next to statues remoulded from mortar shells as well as an image of George Bush surrounded by men's leather brogues, Azzawi’s tapestry stands out as a dominating testament to the massacre that is often referred to as the “forgotten war crime.”
But for those who were there in the aftermath and can recall the events, it is a memory that remains within and will likely never be forgotten.
Journalist Charles Glass, who arrived in Beirut two weeks after the event, describes the pure horror he witnessed as he entered the camps. The “wails and screams” of families who had lost loved ones are something that, “a year on, could still be heard,” he recalls.
But without the involvement of the Israeli army, he says, the massacre would not have been possible. The IDF, which had agreed with the United States to protect the camps, “purposely put their pseudo army (the South Lebanese Army) on buses to join the Lebanese Forces” in their butchery, he says.
Their involvement did not end here. He recalls, “There was no electricity in the camps,” meaning during nighttime, when many of the killings took place, the Israeli forces lit up the sky with flares bright enough for the soldiers to “decipher who they were killing.”
For that reason, Dalloul recognised the value of presenting Azzawi’s tapestry to the world, particularly at this time.
Two years into the genocide witnessed in Gaza today, the act of documenting the realities of warfare has never been more critical.
Palestinian images are consistently under threat, meaning Palestinian suffering exhibited in tapestry form is itself a form of resistance against the subversion and censorship of the Palestinian experience.
The exhibition’s curator, Dalloul, noted that what Azzawi is recording in this work “is a massacre” and by that he means “a mass killing,” but “what we are seeing today in Gaza is a genocide.”
Although the exhibition did not document the obscenities going on in Gaza, it instead served as a reminder that this type of violence has never ceased against Arab populations.
However, Dalloul reasons that a tapestry of its kind is imperative for preserving memory, serving as a substitute for an archive. With the durable nature of tapestries, memory can be embedded into material form.
Huda Baroudi, co-founder of Bokja design studio in Beirut, specialises in the construction of tapestries that have endured over long periods of time.
What sets a tapestry apart from a painting, she says, is the “thickness of the threads which have been coloured using natural dye.”
This means that it can withstand the test of time. This has been proven by hundreds of tapestries from the Medieval Times and the Renaissance period that are still in “pristine condition.”
However, tapestry production is a lengthy and expensive process, resulting in many original factories having shut down. Whilst the craft is undoubtedly at risk, this form of documentation is integral for keeping the memories and experiences of those who have suffered alive.
Every image we have consumed over the past two years via our phones is reflected in Azzawi’s tapestry, and if his work can remind us that violence lies very close to the surface, it can hopefully inspire us not to repeat the mistakes of those who came before.
Chloe Lewin is a UK-based freelance journalist