To Go To The Mountain, 2019

Jordan Nassar’s hand-embroidered work To Go To The Mountain features traditional Palestinian cross-stitch motifs— such as the Gaza-style sarou (cypress), the Palestinian rose, and a diamond amulet—that are typically used as decoration on pillows, clothing, and other domestic items. While these
stitches are regionally and culturally specific, the landscape depicted in Nassar’s work is fictive—that is, based on the artist’s imagination. With this work, Nassar, who was born and raised in New York the child of a Palestinian immigrant, attempts to create a landscape as it exists in the minds of the diaspora, conjuring the almost-mythical Palestine he heard stories about from his family growing up. In this regard, the imaginary landscape may express the experiences of many millions of people living in diaspora, whose lives are propelled by currents of migration, exile, and assimilation and who possess complex relationships to heritage and homeland.