Creative Industries Festival: Photography Exhibition: Beirut Encounters

This is a small photo series, sponsored by the Centre of Research in the Arts, that documents encounters with people and places in Beirut.

The aftermath of the 2020 explosion is still visible alongside vestiges of the civil war. This exhibition explores how Beirut’s residents relax on the Corniche, the uncanny colours of the Luna Park as well as how the city renders visible the changes wrought by catastrophe, war and financial crisis. Resisting unhelpful tropes of resilience, the photos explore instead the ruses and complicity of citizens in getting through the everyday. A series of analogue photographs taken in Beirut, Lebanon Sept 2023.

Claire Launchbury has undertaken research on Lebanon, and Beirut, in particular, since 2011. Her photography explores and documents aspects of the everyday in Beirut and other urban locations, looking at people, cats, ruses and uncanny juxtapositions all shot on analogue film with a very manual Rollei SLR.