A Photograph Is “Not Just Memory”

First presented 12 years ago in Beirut, Lebanon, then in Ramallah, Palestine, the reiteration of the exhibit at the Palestinian Museum places Khalil’s photographs in conversation with the contemporary work of photographer Adam Rouhana. The merging of these works provokes urgent questions, especially relevant during Israel’s genocide in Gaza: “How do we represent ourselves? What does it mean to document a place in the midst of transformation or colonial destruction? And how can the photographic image remain a site of both resistance and reimagining?”2

Khalil documented all aspects of life, and whether spontaneous or staged, his photographs are living proof of a dynamic and diverse life in Palestine that was often depicted to Western audiences as an ancient, empty land whose main interest lay in its biblical-themed landscapes.

The exhibit showcases Khalil’s three styles of, or approaches to, photography: biblical scenes, Ottoman modernity, and studio photography. To capture biblical scenes, Khalil curated them with the help of props, models, and animals to represent biblical stories, which the growing influx of pilgrims and tourists often bought as memorabilia. Alternatively, he would place a horseman on a vast empty land, portraying the Western imagination of the Holy Land.3

The exhibit introduces a new perspective on Khalil’s work, challenging a somewhat critical perception of him as having “adopted and internalized the ‘Orientalist’ image of the Holy Land” by mostly capturing landscapes, portraits, and street scenes.4

As someone who served as the official photographer of the Ottoman army, Khalil’s images of public protests and political events, documentation of day-to-day life of the Ottoman army, and portraits of Turkish military commanders show that he was “very much engaged in the Ottoman political agenda in Syria and Palestine”5 rather than fixated on a stereotypical view of Palestine at the time.

Khalil also practiced studio photography, which grew in popularity in the early 20th century. Having one’s photo taken at Khalil’s studio became a special event for which people decked out in their best attire, either traditional Palestinian dress for an authentic local look or Western-style fashion. The portraits presented at the Palestinian Museum’s exhibit were borrowed from institutions and private collections of people who were lucky enough to keep their family photos after 1948. Most of the portraits that Khalil captured are now scattered all over the world due to the displacement of Palestinians during the Nakba.6

Alongside the portraits of the past, the museum paired the work of a living photographer who has resurrected this style and form of photography, Adam Rouhana. Inspired by Khalil’s legacy, Adam’s Permission to Narrate exhibit “draws a line though history, attempting to navigate a rupture in time to make space for photography in Palestine to develop free of the colonial gaze.” Adam’s exhibit presents portraits of families, friends, and individuals from Hebron and Bethlehem, but he aims to take his mobile studio to every Palestinian city. His purpose is documenting and archiving “the evolving narratives of Palestine and Palestinians”7 across time and space. He achieves this by also revisiting and rephotographing the sites Khalil photographed about a century ago, some of which “have been sanitized and reshaped under continued colonial domination.”8

The exhibit places four of Khalil’s photographs next to Adam’s recreation of them, inviting viewers to personally examine the changes inflicted on these sites in Jerusalem.