Mittwoch, 14. Januar 2026, 17 Uhr (CET)

MOP2, Aula Design

Moderation: Prof. Henk Drees

KHABUR, Documentary, 30 min, Germany, Iran, 2023, DCP

Director Nafis Fathollahzadeh presents the remarkable documentary film “Khabur.”

Nafis Fathollahzadeh (they/them) has made an extraordinary documentary about the effects of colonial (cultural) politics, tracing the consequences of imperialist historiography that still permeate our dealings with looted art today.

The Khabur is the longest tributary of the Euphrates. It originates in present-day Turkey, in the border region with Syria. The prehistoric Halaf culture developed on its banks. German archaeologist Max von Oppenheim began excavating cultural relics in this area in 1899.

The film begins at this archaeological site in the Khabur River valley and follows the journey of the archaeological collection from Tell Halaf to Berlin, where it has been kept since 1930. It traces the spread of violence across time and context along the Khabur River and examines the economic and political power relations that have reshaped the river valley’s landscape. The film treats photography and archaeology as disciplines that emerged from the colonial-imperial enterprise, critically examines the imperial grammar of institutionalized archives, and explores how this grammar could be recycled, rethought, and rehearsed. What is recorded by whom—and for whom? In the re-sorting of the archives, statues speak out as witnesses to an ongoing cynical colonial policy.

After the screening of the film, there will be an online conversation with Nafis Fathollahzadeh, in which we will discuss their work and artistic career in more detail. This will be followed by an open discussion in which you can ask your questions—hopefully many of them! The event will be held in English.

Nafis Fathollahzadeh is a visual artist (they) working across artistic research, moving image, and curatorial practice. 

In the academic years 2020-2022, they are a fellow researcher in the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation’s scholarly program on Authoritarianism and Counter-Strategies and are affiliated with EUME at Forum Transregionale Studien in Berlin. They are an art director and co-editor of Momentography of a failure, a multidisciplinary artistic and urban research platform for collaborative thinking, artistic collaborations, digital mapping, and publishing. Their films premiered at BFI, Doclisboa, Vienna Shorts, Dokumentarist, Duisburger Filmwoche, Prismatic Ground, Golden Apricot, among others.