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ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK VOICEOVER:

Welcome to This Being Human. I’m your host Abdul Rehman-Malik. On this podcast, I talk to extraordinary people from all over the world whose life, ideas and art are shaped by Muslim culture.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

I’m doing my best to form a visual memory about wars, not only just in Yemen, but I hope in the future. This is my future project. So now in exile, I’m continuing doing this.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK VOICEOVER: 

Today, Yemeni street artist Murad Subay on art in a time of war.

 

There’s a recent series of paintings up on Murad Subay’s Instagram account. It’s called Bodies and Language. The paintings show black-and-white bodies against a red background. They’re contorted into the shapes of letters, spelling words in English and Arabic. Words like “War” and “Fear.”

 

MURAD SUBAY: 

It’s a new project that I launched to question the language. You know, the language of hatred, the language of war. And we are focused on the language that we are using nowadays. It’s really full of blood, you know, full of death, full of fears. The fears that lead us to this.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK VOICEOVER: 

Murad posted a video of himself working on this series. And I was struck to see him painting with his fingers.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

You know, it’s always I’m trying to do, like to put my spirit in every painting, whether it’s a good piece or a piece that I am not satisfied of. So, to be closer, sometimes I put my fingers, you know, this is the way you feel. I’m touching it, you know. It’s maybe a childish thing to see, but sometimes I’m talking to the paint, you know, to the canvas and say, “Hey, be good to me and I will be good to you.” Even if you have to kiss the canvas, you have to do it. [laughs]

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

It’s all about love, Murad.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

Indeed, indeed. It’s love, yeah indeed.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK VOICEOVER: 

Murad speaks about all of his art with this kind of passion and purpose. He works mostly in campaigns – series of thematically-linked paintings. His canvas, the bullet-ridden walls of Yemen. It’s impossible to separate his work from the context he grew up in, surrounded by revolution and war.

 

His style is reminiscent of Edward Gorey, with a bit of Andy Warhol or Keith Haring thrown in.

Murad has been called the Yemeni Banksy, but unlike Banksy, he works openly, and in daylight, collaborating with fellow artists and passersby – anyone who wants to join in.

 

Murad Subay joined me from Aix-en-Provence, France, where he’s currently living as a refugee.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

Murad, let’s go back to 2012. So, as we go back to 2012, Yemen has recently had a political revolution. And you decide it’s time for your first street campaign and you call this first campaign, Color the Walls of Your City. And that campaign, from the pictures that I’ve seen, is full of colour and joy and bold images. What was driving you as you began this, as you began this fascinating street art campaign?

 

MURAD SUBAY:

The time came for the revolution. I was engaged in politics in 2007 really strongly. And then in 2011, I was one of the millions of Yemenis, but the first to engage in the revolution. There was a disappointment after that, which is the anti-revolution. You know, it started from inside the revolution itself and then also by the regime. You know, I was living in this area in the hotspot, which divided Sana’a to the north and south. You know, and I was really disappointed, you know. I don’t want to take Kalashnikov. There’s a lot of millions of Kalashnikov and weapons in Yemen. It’s the easiest way to take it. But you know, I had nothing, you know. So, okay, I have colours. It was really simple pieces that I started. I called people to join in this campaign. For one week, I was alone, but I was surprised after one week, the Yemenis, how they came to colour. Because they were afraid, and they are tired of war and conflict. Children, even soldiers. If I tell you, even passersby, even the sellers who are in the [unclear] of the routes, they were trying to paint on the walls. To cover the bullets and the trace of the RPG and the bombs in the walls and the buildings.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

You know, we often think of… especially we often think of the graffiti artist, right? Particularly in Europe and the West, so to speak, as being the genius artist working alone under the cover of night. And that’s so not you. I mean, the fact that your work immediately invited artists, friends, strangers, soldiers, police, mothers, grandmothers, fathers to just join in is so powerful and beautiful and speaks to the culture of the Yemen. But I want to know, why do you work this way Murad? Is it just natural for you to be open and hospitable and welcoming that way in terms of your artwork? Or is it something that you had to kind of think through and kind of do intentionally or is it both?

 

MURAD SUBAY:

In fact, I am an introvert. I love to stay alone.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

[laughs] That surprises me. That surprises me.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

No Abdul-Rehman, really. If I tell you that I was– when there are visitors to the house, because you know the family house, because my brother, he was always inviting intellectuals from around the world and Yemen too, to the house. So, I was always eating alone. I don’t like to eat with the visitors. Okay. Who taught me to be social is the people who join the campaigns. Because I was doing like just a call on the Internet and say– it’s the first time I say this because you go deeper actually. After 12 years, the first time I speak about this. I was really surprised when I was doing the wall, the first day after one week. And I go back and I see a long line of people. And in the other sites, also children, they are painting on the wall. The fact is this: the people, and imagine this is after a disappointment of a revolution, you know. The people, they spread joy. The real reason and success behind the establishment of the street art and those campaigns to make them stronger in the community in Yemen, it’s the people themselves.

 

But also, there was something else, Abdul-Rehman. They didn’t come just because they find a wall and okay, there are colours and they are not stupid, you know. There was a very important question they asked me before, from where do you get your fund? I tell them, hey, I bring my colours what I can. Because we are skeptical people. I said, I’m bringing my colours by myself. Anyone who can help us to bring colours, they bring. Not money. I don’t want money. Don’t give me cash. I will not accept because always money ruins everything. So, the thing is this: People start to bring their own colours by themselves and to paint. Because this is the idea. If you have a perfect idea, you have to protect it. First of all, from the money, from the people who want to steal it.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

I feel like you Murad. And in fact, I feel as the war, as the revolution, as you said, the hope of the revolution comes to the end. And as war erupts in Yemen again, I feel like your art loses its colour, literally. Like, like many of your campaigns that follow, like Ruins and Faces of War, are now almost monochromatic. They’re haunting images done in one or two colours, done with negative space and yet they’re still campaigns. So tell me a little bit about when your art starts to lose its colour. At that point, what’s your– for lack of a better word, what’s your aspiration? What’s your agenda? Or are you just sharing what you’re feeling? What’s going on in that transformation from Color your Street to Ruins and Faces of War?

 

MURAD SUBAY:

Well, actually, what drives me is that I live this moment.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

Mhm.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

And also I start to get in the heads of people as well. You know before I start a new project I have to– you know, it’s like a sponge. You have to put it in like water and then take part of this water, you know, or to swack it, you know. So I have to go spiritually, by spirit and by heart, like I did with enforced disappearance families and then with Ruins. Sometimes I have to visit the place where I am in different, not only once, it’s just two or three times, you know, sometimes, to see it in different way, in different time, you meet new people, so you have to feel it. But there is a pride in this. I’m not here to say that the Yemenis are victims. Yemenis are suffering and struggling with respect to look to any person who suffered the war. They are struggling, not victims. They are fighting to be victimized. Because what I notice is that when the international media, they show Yemenis, I mean, it’s a really disgusting image. You know how they… broken wings, the people who have no charisma, the people who are even like this, you know. No, it’s disgusting. This is dehumanizing. While in some other places, they show the pride, even [though] they are victims. So, no. Abdul-Rehman, always when I am talking about victims and struggling people here, I am speaking that we should respect how much they are standing.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

I feel like, like in some ways, your campaigns are giving voice to the lived experience of the Yemeni people and creating a space where they can, first of all, see themselves and in a way, they know that they’re being listened to. That their struggles, their resilience, the tragedies that they’re facing, the incredible hope that they have, is represented somewhere. And Murad Subay, in a way, is doing his part to represent that.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

This is the meaning of it: campaigns. It’s not just centralized about me, you know. I launch that idea, I launch the theme and then I lit it. Because, if you have a good idea with love created and then a noble intuition.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

Mm hmm.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

And you continue. You’ll be surprised. I mean, if I tell you that one of the biggest campaigns that I launched in Yemen that led to finding people alive after three decades of disappearance. It’s called the Walls Remember Their Faces. And for seven months, we printed around 800 with the repetition for 102 persons who had disappeared. That led to discussion in the parliament. And unfortunately, this was prevented and interrupted by the war later and other actions. But this campaign started with around half dollar and an idea. It’s a half dollar, less than a half dollar, because now the dollar is 600 Rial. It was started by 350 Rial. So the thing is, it’s not about the quantity or the money you have, maybe you have millions, but you cannot lead anything because you have to have the idea and also the noble intuition. And I’m now 35 years old. I can see, Abdul-Rehman, that I hope that I am in the right way. You know, I never… Yes, there was a lot of costs the person has to pay, but it’s perfect to be like this. I can sleep well in the night.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

You can only sleep well when you have integrity. And I can hear your integrity, Murad. Murad, you know, I actually hate comparisons between artists in some ways because it’s a shorthand to kind of explain somebody’s work and not do the due diligence and the hard work of engaging with them. But you have been called the Yemeni Banksy, and I want to know what you think about that comparison.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

You know, first of all, it’s all the great things to Banksy. He’s a legend, you know, artist and well I… no need to speak about him because he doesn’t need anyone to speak about him anymore. So, the thing is this, I’m a humble artist. I have my story, you know. I have a small name. It’s Murad. That my father give it to me after one month, because the story of this – my father was working in another country and he has to send the cassette. You know, the cassette in 80s, you know. So I was without a name for one month until my father decided my name, you know. Send in a cassette, you’ll have to call this person Murad. So I can imagine the journey of the cassette when he go and come back, you know. So, you know, he’s a great artist. It’s an honor that my work is compared to him. Also, there is a side of a story of my work with my people, you know, in Yemen during the revolution and then the war and then now in exile. You know, sometimes if you’re just the Yemeni Banksy, I’ve seen it here, sometimes the idea of it, it’s just the Yemeni Banksy. It’s a second version, because there is a great poet. His name is Nizar Qabbani. And he said that the community, the people never accept the second vision, you know. So of course, it’s great to be a second version of Banksy, you know. But Walla, that’s it, you know. But it’s great, you know.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

You know I guess the real difference for me is and that’s a very generous answer Murad. And you are Murad Subay and your work stands on its own. And you know, just looking at your work over the past sort of decade, decade and a half, there is a look and a feel to it. And you know, Banksy works in the middle of the night with no one around. That’s part of his artifice. That’s part of his process. You’ve always worked openly. You’ve used your own name. Murad, how dangerous has it been to do the work that you do in the country and homeland that you come from?

 

MURAD SUBAY:

Okay. I’ll tell you this story. Of course, I understand the situation of artists in Europe, because in the beginning, if they do not do this, there will be fees. To be… fees to take– to pay money, a lot, if they caught them, the police. But in Yemen, for example, my brother, he was shot because of his opinions, in his legs. The two legs. So he has to leave Yemen. And then I left Yemen after him by two years. When I started to paint in the revolution, the people were protecting me. I was protected by the people, because we have in the transitional period, we had a strong existence as youth and people, you know, we can influence things. But then after you will be subjected to threat, psychological threats. You have no idea. Sometimes it can drive you… There was a very difficult moment in my life in 2017, between May until November. So this period was really complicated for me in terms of psychologically and financial, everything. What I was thinking, I’m about to drive to get crazy. But I use this energy to create a very important project which is called Faces of War, which I’m still continue working on this project until now in exile. So, there is a lot of complications because you have to think, ah okay, I don’t have anything to lose. Because already your friends been assassinated. A lot of intellectuals being killed, poisoned. So this is the thing, you have to close your door with a strong, because in the night always that is, was this psychological where they attack in the night to a custody to, to take you to a custody. I’ve been subjected two times to, Abdul-Rehman, to investigations and it’s like this. It’s like a risk. When you find yourself in a situation – this is the good thing about human beings – you have to accustom whether not to to be obedient, to fight, of course. To accustom, but you have to be strong enough to understand your blood is not really precious than the others. Already people lost their life. You saw them. And voila, just this. You know, I found myself in this situation and I moved on. That’s it.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

And you kept doing the art, though. Throughout all of this, you kept the painting. You kept doing it.

 

MURAD SUBAY: 

Abdul-Rehman if I tell you this. Why I want to go back again to war zone areas? Because there is something else. The eyes of the people when they’re watching me doing art. It’s incredible. This feeling you will not feel it in, even MoMA. Even, I don’t know, British Museum or, I don’t know, the biggest… Louvre. You will not have this feeling to do a wall in a war zone. This is why I’m just– I’m missing something. I feel that, yes, now I’m in a safe country and I have sometimes to work other jobs to make a living, to continue, because the art of my need doesn’t feed usually, always because you have, it’s different. The world market is really selective also as well. So this is the thing, you know. It’s really different when you see the people, how they believe in you, you know. Sometimes they tell me, “Hey, what are you doing? Well, this ruins, what are you doing?” It’s really incredible.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK VOICEOVER: 

Murad recently made a mural called Diaspora that captures some of his feelings about leaving his home country. The painting looks like a cut off film strip. It shows three people reaching out to each other, but pieces of themselves – a hand, a foot – are left behind.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

Imagine a person who has two feet, one in a country and the other in a country – a stable country and a country at war. So you are not really stable. You cannot imagine this. Sometimes it can crush you and drive you to be crazy with a real disconnect with their country or the others. Because I have already seen many experiences of people who they have to cut with their families because they cannot do anything for them. So they felt useless, you know? So it’s normal. It’s normal. So there is no judgment in here. But to have also in this such experience, which is we call it al-balwā, to be.. it’s, it’s really powerful. It’s, it’s voilà. It’s just this.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

No, it’s as you speak about it, I think anyone who’s experienced being part of diaspora or migration or movement or has that in their DNA will understand it, right? This idea of instability and constantly trying to find balance. And I think to myself how does Murad Subay find balance?

 

MURAD SUBAY:

There is one thing that gives me stability. It’s to keep moving. It’s maybe escaping. Maybe. Maybe it’s escaping also. I don’t like to give myself to think a lot about situations. Anything if there is something annoy me. “Ah. Try to make it a project.” Because I will tell you this. I stopped seven months in a war without doing anything. It was the most critical and hectic situation, one of the most in my life. When you think of really, really dark moments, when you start to talk to yourself, Abdul-Rehman, and you do not differentiate between the reality and the non-reality. This is a moment you are wretched when you feel life, families and marriages collapsing, your country collapsing, your friends dying and the economic nothing. There is no horizon. But this is why, how I am learning from that experience, to not let myself even thinking a moment. Sometimes people, they ask me here, they say, “Hey, how do you keep smiling, and even you came from this–”. Really dear friends they often, how? We have just– Some people they have a problem with their girlfriends or they have a drug problem, you know, and these are sad, you know, and you’re just laughing because it’s a choice. I choose to be happy and to laugh, you know, and I will continue because there is only just remains maybe half of my life or less in this life. It’s an opportunity to be alive, even if it is hard. We have to appreciate it, you know.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

I’m hearing you. I’m listening to you. I’m hearing these incredible stories and I hear a lot of life and joy in you. And yet you’re dealing with things that are really heavy and that are really difficult. And you’re dealing with things that you have seen and experienced in your own family, in your own neighborhood, amongst the people that you love that I think would have broken some people and have broken them. but you don’t seem to be broken to me. You seem to exude this incredible strength. And so I want to know, Murad, what do you draw on to do the work that you do and to give voice and life to places where life is being taken away?

 

MURAD SUBAY:

It’s definitely in one word: it’s the love. The love for the things you do, the love for… for the idea just we are, you know, that we are not alone maybe in this world, you know.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

It says. It says so much–

 

MURAD SUBAY:

I mean, I am trying to be philosophical but it’s just one word, you know? It’s just the love, you know? The love, the love. It’s not the love, the form of love between two partners, you know. It’s the love in its biggest form, which is to everything, beauty, to the idea, to the universe, to human beings, to nature. You know, it’s this, you know.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

Murad Subay, tell me about a moment of joy or a moment of meanness that recently came to you as an unexpected visitor.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

Since we already speak about always just nice things, you know, we didn’t speak about really mean things of human beings. We are not clear. There is always a dark spot in us, you know? The meanness when you start to believe the dark side of your life. This is a moment where you have to be careful. As my brother used to say, don’t believe your ego because it’s like the black hole. It can swallow you. And I believe that the only enemy of somebody is their tongue, their behaviour. And I’m just, you know, trying to do my best, you know, to fight even this dark side of you. You know, not to live the war. As Jalaluddin Rumi said, Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi, he said that when you live in a war, when you escape from this war or a difficult situation, live your life as a survivor, not as a victim.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK:

Murad Subay, it’s been such an honour and privilege to have you on This Being Human.

 

MURAD SUBAY:

Thank you. Thank you so much.

 

ABDUL-REHMAN MALIK VOICEOVER: 

Thank you for listening to This Being Human. We’ll include links to some of Murad Subay’s art in the show notes.

 

This Being Human is produced by Antica Productions in partnership with TVO. Our Senior Producer is Kevin Sexton. Our associate producer is Hailey Choi. Our executive producer is Laura Regehr. Stuart Coxe is the president of Antica Productions.

 

Mixing and sound design by Phil Wilson. Our associate audio editor is Cameron McIver. Original music by Boombox Sound.

 

Shaghayegh Tajvidi is TVO’s Managing Editor of Digital Video and Podcasts. Laurie Few is the executive for digital at TVO.

 

This Being Human is generously supported by the Aga Khan Museum. Through the arts, the Aga Khan Museum sparks wonder, curiosity, and understanding of Muslim cultures and their connection with other cultures.

 

The Museum wishes to thank The Hilary and Galen Weston Foundation for their generous support of This Being Human.