WORDS AND IMAGES BY RASHA AL JUNDI
“When the Grapes Were Sour” is a multimedia documentary photography project that combines photography, audio and applied traditional Palestinian embroidery to finished and printed portraits. Depending on the story, related archival images are also incorporated.
It has been 74 years since the Palestinian people suffered the traumatic events that led to the Nakba, or “catastrophe,” that started in April 1948. While the Nakba climaxed on May 15th, and led to the forced expulsion of more than 800,000 Palestinians, it continued throughout that same year. Many declare it an ongoing assault to this day with the continued uprooting and blockading of this Indigenous population.
According to 2022 updated figures from the Palestine Land Society, there are more than 14 million Palestinians inside the occupied territories and around the world, of whom more than nine million are registered refugees.
This renders Palestinians the largest refugee population in the world.
Many Palestinian exiles whether in urban, rural or refugee camp settings still have hope to return to the homeland. With time, this dream and internationally acknowledge right of return gets more complicated.
Yet it never completely disappears from the back of the minds and hearts of some exiles.
Others chose to erase their connection to their roots either due to trauma, shame or their own hope to shape a firm identify by adopting a new one.
Through this project, I aim to create personal accounts of individuals who identify as Palestinian exiles around the world. I chose to apply cross-stitched embroidery by hand to printed portraits to keep this key part of our cultural heritage alive while we struggle with our identity, fragmentation and the presently hostile political climate against the Palestinians’ right to self determination.
You are invited to use the QR codes below to see and feel deeper into this story: