Prayer Rug Selfies
(2017 – ...)
Prayer Rug Selfies is a series of photographs which documents the spaces in which Marwan Bassiouni performed a number of his daily Islamic prayers over the last eight years. Shortly after finishing his act of worship and before folding up the thin prayer rug that his dad had gifted him, Bassiouni would regularly document the spaces where he had just prayed by taking out his mobile phone and making what he would call a ‘prayer rug selfie’. He consistently took the photographs from the same distance and angle thereby emphasizing the position of the rug and suggesting a symbolism of immobility and stillness. Each image would thereby not only document the variety of spaces in which the artist would find himself worshipping but also the direction of Mecca – what Muslims call ‘the qibla’ (compass). These images are those of a solitary Muslim. Their compositions are not the result of a desire to photograph but rather of a need to pray on time.