Encounters on the Tigris, Part 1

Encounters on the Tigris follows a journey taken by artist and filmmaker Sherko Abbas in 2022, along the ancient Tigris river, in search of previously undocumented oral traditions and the ecological knowledge they hold. His journey begins in the Kurdish Zakho district of northern Iraq and ends in Al Faw, where the river meets the Persian Gulf in the south.

Featuring interviews with folklorists, Quranic scholars, musicians and local communities, Abbas captures songs and stories about water that have been transmitted orally from one generation to the next for centuries. At a time when climate change is beginning to have devastating impacts across the region, the film highlights the precarity of communities who depend on the river and the environmental instability resulting from Iraq’s recent history, revealing ancient cultural traditions increasingly at odds with new ecological realities.

Sherko Abbas
Kurdish-Iraqi artist Sherko Abbas was born in Iran in 1978, where his family lived as refugees. They returned to Iraq when he was two years old. Abbas studied Fine Art in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq and went on to earn an MFA from Goldsmiths College, London in 2015. His work explores sonic and visual memory, with a focus on modern memory that relies on archival materials. Abbas is interested in the current geopolitical situation in Iraq. His works have been exhibited internationally including at: the Iraq pavilion at the 57th Venice biennale; MoMA PS1, New York; the Kunsthalle Münster, Germany; Middle East Institute, Washington D.C.; and the Institut des Cultures d’Islam, Paris, among others. His moving image works have been screened at the 38th Kassel Documentary Film and Video Festival in Kassel, Aashra, Ashkal Alwan Online Film, Rencontres Internationales Paris/ Berlin at the Louvre Auditorium in Paris, the Open City Documentary Combined Programme: What Rules The Invisible in London, Visit Festival Het Bos Ankerrui 5-7 in Antwerp, Belgium, Ruya Shop in Baghdad, and Shasha Movies online streaming.

Sherko Abbas

Kurdish-Iraqi artist Sherko Abbas was born in Iran in 1978, where his family lived as refugees. They returned to Iraq when he was two years old. Abbas studied Fine Art in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq and went on to earn an MFA from Goldsmiths College, London in 2015. His work explores sonic and visual memory, with a focus on modern memory that relies on archival materials. Abbas is interested in the current geopolitical situation in Iraq. His works have been exhibited internationally including at: the Iraq pavilion at the 57th Venice biennale; MoMA PS1, New York; the Kunsthalle Münster, Germany; Middle East Institute, Washington D.C.; and the Institut des Cultures d’Islam, Paris, among others. His moving image works have been screened at the 38th Kassel Documentary Film and Video Festival in Kassel, Aashra, Ashkal Alwan Online Film, Rencontres Internationales Paris/ Berlin at the Louvre Auditorium in Paris, the Open City Documentary Combined Programme: What Rules The Invisible in London, Visit Festival Het Bos Ankerrui 5-7 in Antwerp, Belgium, Ruya Shop in Baghdad, and Shasha Movies online streaming.

More about Sherko Abbas