Taawon-Welfare Association has announced that Dr. Adila Laïdi-Hanieh will be the new Director of the Palestinian Museum starting September 2018. Dr. Laïdi-Hanieh is a writer and academic focusing on Palestinian art and cultural practices, modern Arab intellectual history and cultural spaces and processes.
Dr. Laïdi-Hanieh was the founding director of the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Centre from 1996 until 2005. She built its programmes around three foci: Palestinian cultural identity, support for the visual arts, and arts outreach. There, she curated the landmark memorial art exhibition "100 Shaheed – 100 Lives" (2001- 2003).
She received her Ph.D. in Cultural Studies from George Mason University and a Masters degree in Arab Studies from Georgetown University. She obtained a postdoctoral fellowship from the Arab Council for the Social Sciences. Her academic work encompasses critical theory, aesthetics, ideology theory, and postcolonial studies. She taught Modern and Contemporary Arab Thought, and Palestinian Art History at Birzeit University from 2006 until 2008.
Dr. Laïdi-Hanieh published several books and essays, including the artist biography "Fahrelnissa Zeid. Painter of Inner Worlds" in 2017. She also published "Palestine. Rien ne nous manque ici" (Palestine. We lack for nothing here) in 2008; which explored contemporary Palestine from a critical cultural perspective.
In response to her appointment, Dr. Laïdi-Hanieh expressed her appreciation and acknowledgement of the responsibilities placed upon her, praising the achievements of the Museum, and looking forward to expanding and developing its mission.
The Palestinian Museum is an independent institution dedicated to supporting an open and dynamic Palestinian culture nationally and internationally. The Museum presents and engages with new perspectives on Palestinian history, society and culture. It also offers spaces for creative ventures, educational programmes and innovative research. The Museum is one of the most exciting new cultural projects in Palestine and is a flagship project of Taawon-Welfare Association which is an independent Palestinian non-profit organisation, committed to providing development and humanitarian assistance to Palestinians in the West Bank, Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip, 1948 Areas, and the Palestinian communities in Lebanon. This year marks 35 years of continuous giving, humanitarian work and development.