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Bisan Abu-Eisheh
Born in 1985 in Jerusalem, Palestine / Lives in Jerusalem, Palestine

Adriano Pedrosa (AP): How did you conceive Bayt Byoot “Playing House” (2008–11), the work you are exhibiting at the biennial?

Bisan Abu-Eisheh (BAE): The work is a collection of pieces I gathered from demolished houses in some areas in Jerusalem. They range from objects of daily and personal life, such as pieces of clothing, kitchen utensils, and CDs, to parts of the architecture, such as granite, wood, and pipes. The pieces are presented in museum-like vitrines, each with a label describing where it comes from, a blueprint of the original house, the date of the demolition, and the number of people who used to live in the house. Also included are copies of documents about the demolition of houses in Jerusalem and a video of an explosion in the demolition of a five-story building in Beit Hanina, a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem, which I found on YouTube.

AP: When were the buildings originally constructed? How do you get hold of the blueprints?

BAE: Some of them have been built, destroyed, and rebuilt several times, but they are all from the last 40 years. In the beginning I was getting the blueprints from the construction companies, but later I started to interview the people who had lived in these houses and asked them to redraw the floor plans from memoryIn some cases, I would draw what they described to me. Some of this was documented on video.

AP: What is the status of these demolished houses? Who is demolishing them, and under what jurisdiction?

BAE: The houses belong to Palestinians living in Jerusalem. There are other houses being demolished by the Israeli government in Gaza and on the West Bank, but my project is focused on Jerusalem, where I live. The Israeli municipality of Jerusalem is demolishing the houses. They say that the houses do not have proper permits, but construction permits are so expensive and bureaucratic. One needs to hire a lawyer, and the process becomes so costly that it is impossible for most families.

AP: Are the owners of the houses somehow compensated?

BAE: On the contrary, they are actually billed for the destruction costs. One person I interviewed was billed 50,000 shekels by the municipality—the cost of the explosives and the extra security personnel needed to close the street for the destruction.

AP: Since when has this been happening? Are these destructions part of a larger strategy?

BAE: The earliest record I have found according to B’Tselem, the Israeli information center for human rights in the occupied territories, is from 1988, but the destruction has increased in the last decade. Jerusalem is a divided city—its borders are contested and these destructions are part of a plan by the Israeli government to expel the Palestinians living in Jerusalem, or to make it harder for them to live there, occupying these territories.