Installation view of DAMAR TV by Sophia Al-Maria within untitled 2026 (a gathering of remarkable people). Photo: Giuseppe Miotto, Marco Cappelletti Studio.
Sophia Al-Maria presents DAMAR TV (2026), a new video work, at untitled 2026 (a gathering of remarkable people) — a group exhibition at the National Pavilion of Qatar, 61st International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia, co-curated by Tom Eccles and Ruba Katrib.
DAMAR TV is a kaleidoscopic journey through the collapsing dreamworld of broadcast television, the haunted architecture of empire’s dreams, and the fragile possibility of finding a human voice again after silent catastrophe. The film follows Damar Darwish, a celebrated television journalist on the DMR News Network, whose career implodes after an on-air confrontation with a reality denier. Silenced, unemployable, and spiritually untethered, Damar drifts through a fractured landscape of newsrooms, ruins, national pavilions, musical encounters, bureaucratic nightmares, television memories, and impossible geographies both real and imagined. As the borders between media, memory, propaganda, fantasy, and history begin to dissolve, the film transforms into a feverish search for meaning in an age where language itself has broken down.
untitled 2026 (a gathering of remarkable people) builds on artist Rirkrit Tiravanija’s practice of inviting collaborators to activate his architectural and spatial scenarios. In a tent-like structure designed by Tiravanija for Biennale Arte 2026, presentations spanning film, sculpture, live performances, and a culinary program by aritsts Al-Maria, Tarek Atoui, Alia Farid, Fadi Kattan are brought together to create a nourishing experience for audiences.
