The Preservation Complex: A Dialogue with Chad Elias

In this dialogue, Tabet speaks with Chad Elias about his practice in relation to Beirut's ongoing construction boom and the erasure of the city's architectural heritage. As with his ongoing project on the restoration of artifacts destroyed in Berlin's Tell Halaf Museum during World War II, the artist's sculptural engagement with materials scavenged from demolished historical buildings in the Lebanese capital raises crucial questions about the dictates of architectural preservation, overlaid in this instance with the contradictions produced by unregulated urban development and a volatile political landscape.