Collections
Multi-National Force: Iraq In Agatha Christie's They Came to Baghdad / Mike Mandel and Chantal Zakari
Books
FA.B105.1776
9.25 x 6.25 in; 23.5 x 15.5 cm
2012
Unpaginated, color, hardcover work with perfect binding. Work consists of images of covers Agatha Christie's "They Came to Baghdad" published in very countries around the world.
From colophon:
"On March 5, 2007, a car bomb was exploded on Al-Mutanabbi Street in Baghdad. Al-Mutanabbi Street is in a mixed Shia-Sunni area. More than 30 people were killed and more than 100 were wounded. Al-Mutanabbi Street, the historic center of Baghdad bookselling, holds bookstores and outdoor bookstalls, cafes, stationary, tea, and tobacco shops. It has been an integral center of the Baghdad literary and intellectual community.
This book, 'They Came to Baghdad', is a response to The Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition's call for 130 book artists to 're-assemble' some of the 'inventory' of the reading material that was lost in the car bombing. One complete set has been donated to the Iraq National Library. The other two sets are employed as exhibitions in Europe and the U.S. to raise funds for Medecins Sans Frontieres."
Statement from the artists:
"'Baghdad is the chosen location for a secret superpower meeting' in Agatha Christie's, 'They Came to Baghdad' which has been translated into more than 30 languages and has been published continuously since it first appeared in England in 1951. In our book, They Came to Baghdad, Christie's 40 book covers conjure an exotic site for diplomatic, and romantic intrigue. They parallel the second chapter, excerpts and images of the 40 countries that have participated in the Multi-National Force deploying troops to Iraq between 2003 and 2011. In our final chapter, the invasion continues; it's an index of corporate logos of the contractors hired for the reconstruction of Iraq and the major foreign investors involved. The work is based entirely on websearch, not only from traditional media sources, but also from alternative sources that have now entered the public sphere. From ebay and amazon, blog entries around the world translated through Google Translate, flickr and myspace all contributed to our visual narrative."