“We don’t like it as it is but we don’t know what we want it to be”: The Speculative Archive

CULTURAL POLITICS 123 REPRINTS AVAILABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE PUBLISHERS. PHOTOCOPYING PERMITTED BY LICENSE ONLY© BERG 2007 PRINTED IN THE UK CULTURAL POLITICS VOLUME 3, ISSUE 1 PP 123–132 FIELD REPORT “WE DON’T LIKE IT AS IT IS BUT WE DON’T KNOW WHAT WE WANT IT TO BE.” The Speculative Archive JULIA MELTZER AND DAVID THORNE Since 1999 The Speculative Archive has developed two bodies of work consisting of installation projects, photographs, and films. The first focused on state secrecy practices,memory,and history. Our current projects focus on the use of documents – images, texts, objects, bodies, and physical structures – to project and claim visions of the future in a time of war on terror. Much of our recent work is based on a year spent living and working in Damascus, Syria. We are currently in postproduction on a film, We don’t like it as it is but we don’t know what we want it to be. We arrived in Syria in January 2005 having done considerable research on “preventive war,” “preemption,” and “imminent threat,” with particular emphasis on how these concepts and practices affect the experience of time. Over a period of a year in Damascus, we became interested in JULIA MELTZER IS A MEDIA ARTIST AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF CLOCKSHOP , A NONPROFIT PRODUCTION COMPANY IN LOS ANGELES. DAVID THORNE IS AN ARTIST LIVING AND WORKING IN LOS ANGELES. THEY HAVE COLLABORATED ON THE SPECULATIVE ARCHIVE SINCE 1999. WWW.SPECULATIVEARCHIVE.ORG > CULTURAL POLITICS 124 FIELD REPORT CULTURAL POLITICS 125 FIELD REPORT the ways in which these concepts and practices affect the Syrian regime, and, by extension, the people they rule. While our starting point may have been the “Bush Doctrine,” it became clear that the Syrian regime, dominated by the Asad family, uses the concepts of imminent threat and preemption to their own advantage. The threats to Syria, according to the regime, are many – a possible US and/or Israeli invasion and occupation, the growing influence of political Islam, and the possibility that simmering ethnic and tribal divisions could erupt into civil war, Iraq or Lebanon-style. These scenarios – visions of things to come – become justifications for the maintenance of the status quo. “Better the devil you know.” From April to August 2005 we conducted interviews with seven Syrians ranging in age from 24–50. These people included several members of the opposition, a professor, a journalist, a Sheikha (female sheik), a young activist, and a writer. All agreed to be on camera and to speak openly. Through these interviews we sought to understand the ways in which time is and has been manipulated internally by a regime whose main interest is self-preservation. How does this particular governing body project itself across time – between past and future – in order to perpetuate and strengthen itself as a regime? How do people identify, believe, and position themselves in relation to the ruling power and to the religious, family, and social structures that constitute the time they live in? What is the experience of time? How do they envision the future? Among the people we interviewed was Yassein Haj-Saleh, a member of the opposition who was imprisoned for 16 years. Yassein, now a journalist, speaks about a “third and fourth way” which envisions a political future for Syria that begins from a moderate Islamic position, is democratic, and is able to maintain a critical stance towards US policy in the region. At the conclusion of the interview process, we began looking at the buildings and structures that make up the city of Damascus, in search of a visual and cinematic correlation to the ideas we had been discussing with our interview subjects. At the center of the city in Martyr’s Square, there is a looming, unfinished concrete structure, slated to become a shopping center with a large attached mosque. Begun in 1982, the structure remains unfinished to this day. It is named after Basel Al-Asad, the son of late president Hafez al-Asad. Basel – revered as the hope for the future of the country – was killed in a car crash in January 1994. As we inquired about this building, we...