You Can Crush the Flowers

A Visual Memoir of the Egyptian Revolution

Bahia Shehab

• Publisher: Gingko
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781909942530
• eBook ISBN: 9781909942585
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: Art General

Part visual history, part memoir, You Can Crush the Flowers is a chronicle of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution and its aftermath, as it manifested itself not only in the art on the streets of Cairo but also through the wider visual culture that emerged during the revolution. Marking the ten-year anniversary of the revolution, celebrated Egyptian-Lebanese artist Bahia Shehab tells the stories that inspired both her own artwork and the work of her fellow revolutionaries. Shehab narrates the events of the revolution as they unfolded, describing on one hand the tactics deployed by the regime to drive protesters from the street—from the use of tear gas and snipers to brute force, intimidation techniques, and virginity tests—and on the other hand the retaliation by the protesters online and on the street in marches, chants, street art, and memes. Throughout this powerful and moving account, which includes over one hundred images, Shehab responds to all these aspects of the revolution as both artist and activist. The result bears witness to the brutality of the regime and pays tribute to the protestors who bravely defied it.

 

24 ‘Portraits of Martyrs’, on the outer walls of the American University in Cairo by Ammar Abu Bakr, Mohammed Mahmoud street, Cairo, Egypt, November 2012

5 First Anniversary

January to March 2012

It is January 2012. The first anniversary of the revolution is nearly upon us and I am gripped by a deep sense of melancholy.

I have just returned from a week in the US and the Netherlands. Everywhere I went I found myself making comparisons. In New York, I visited the Metropolitan Museum’s Islamic art section after its recent renovation. I was almost in tears seeing works of art I have studied for years quietly displayed in front of me. For my research on the Fatimids, I had booked a private viewing session of specific works. A curator met with me, led me to the storage area and allowed me to touch the artworks, with gloves on. I was overwhelmed. This simple scholarly act of studying an artwork up close would have taken months of negotiations and pulling strings at a museum in Cairo, and after all your efforts you might still be denied access.

I think about the social and economic structures that make the process of heritage protection possible. I do not forget that I had to apply for a visa and get on a plane for twelve hours just to see these artworks, a privilege that many scholars from my part of the world do not have. Nor did I forget that some of these artefacts were looted. In a parallel universe, these artefacts would have been preserved and protected in their country of origin and would form the basis from which artists and thinkers create new work, uninterrupted by colonisers. These objects are part of the collective memory of the people who created them; being detached from them detaches us from our history and identity.

In the Netherlands, I went to Leiden to see my PhD supervisors at the university. Leiden is a beautiful city of old, well-maintained buildings. Instead of destroying the fabric of the city to widen roads for cars, people ride bicycles. In Cairo, pavements are so uneven that a person with a disability cannot get around the city alone — as I discovered for myself when I broke my knee last year. In Leiden, I saw a disabled dog with a wheeled metal walking support, happily able to get around independently. I went to visit the children’s museum in The Hague and this again made me lament the fact that our children will not grow up to have such institutions abundantly available to them. Suzanne Mubarak was working on building such a museum, which was being designed by a team of Italian interior designers. But why do we need Italian designers to design a museum for children in Cairo?

**

As the first anniversary of the revolution approaches, the old regime is fighting back. A government-employed schoolteacher has shared a printed handout with her students, asking them not to join demonstrations and not to critique the military, as this will mark them out as traitors. It’s a long page that someone has posted on social media and I can’t be bothered to read it all, really. And, of course, there are the usual conspiracy theories trying to portray the revolutionary factions as being funded by the US and Israel.

The revolutionaries retaliate with their customary black humour, predicting the programme of events for 25 January, the first anniversary of the beginning of the revolution:

	6am – 12pm:	Demonstrators enter Tahrir
	12 – 1pm:	Hosing the demonstrators segment
	2 – 3pm:	Bullets and explosions segment
	3 – 4pm:	The horse and camel segment
	4 – 5pm:	(Ladies only) Pulling and scraping
	5 – 6pm:	The clown Tawfik Okasha Toufik Omasha [pun on the name of the TV presenter Tawfik Okasha, a mouthpiece of the regime]
	6 – 7pm:	The magician segment by ‘the third party’ [reference to externally funded ‘traitors’ conspiracy theories]
	7 – 12pm:	Fireworks, Molotov and building a fence around the square segment
	Dinner:	Pizza and ribs [reference to the actress Afaf Shoeib’s comment last year that her little nephew wanted to eat pizza and ribs, but he couldn’t because there was a revolution in the streets]

On 25 January, I decide to go to the square. Maybe being among the people who share the dream will make my melancholy bearable. I park my car off Qasr El-Nil Bridge and set off walking alone. I am searched by civilians and allowed into the crowd. I am engulfed by the thousands of people who are still flooding into Tahrir in groups. The festivities are genuine. As I walk, people are clapping to chants for equality, peace and a new government: ‘We are the People! We are a red line! We are the People, not the military, not the police, and we are not political parties dividing up a cake! Down with military rule! They killed a Christian and a Sheikh!’ Protesters are carrying posters of Sheikh Emad Effat (for whom I sprayed ‘No to killing men of religion’) and Mina Daniel, a Copt killed by the regime, two figures who have become symbols of the revolution and of the people’s interreligious unity in the face of a regime that is killing Muslims and Copts alike.

A man holds up a sign inscribed with the word ‘Silmiyya’ (Peaceful). Behind him an eight-metre obelisk made of wood engraved with the names of all the martyrs is drifting slowly towards Tahrir Square over the heads of the people forming the dense crowd.

Alaa Abd El-Fattah, an activist and blogger who is a living symbol of the revolution, is giving an interview among the crowd. A few other celebrities are making appearances and being interviewed by different media outlets. Stages for different political parties have been set up and there is a strong presence for Syria with a large tent and flags everywhere. I have never seen such political diversity represented in the Arab world: the communists, socialists, Salafists and Muslim Brotherhood all have flags and leaflets and an audience. It is as if ideologies from all over the Arab world are present in Tahrir in celebration of the day. I’m alone, but I feel like I’m part of an amazing dream and that all these people who are here in the square one year after the revolution are sharing this dream with me.

**

On the evening of 1 February, news of riots in Port Said starts to trickle in. Al-Ahly and al-Masry, two teams in the Egyptian Premier League, were playing a football match there. Eyewitnesses reported that following the match the doors of the stadium were locked and the lights switched off. Al-Ahly supporters were attacked and 74 people were killed and more than 500 injured. The news on state television says that the al-Masry fans attacked the al-Ahly supporters following their team’s victory.

The whole story sounds illogical. The Ultras — the most fanatical supporters of particular football teams — have been one of the driving forces for rallying people throughout the revolution in Tahrir and all over the country. This looks like payback. The al-Ahly supporters were trapped inside and attacked with clubs, daggers and stones. Football fans turn violent sometimes, but I have never heard of 74 deaths and 500 wounded in a fan fight.

A ‘Friday of Anger’ is announced with marches to Tahrir starting the day before. University Student Unions issue statements declaring a general strike to protest the revolution being sabotaged. They say they will boycott classes and hold demonstrations until their demands are met. They are asking for SCAF to hand power over to civilians and an elected government, and to end the transitional period of military rule.

25. ‘You can crush the flowers but you can’t delay spring’, by Bahia Shehab, 2012

One of the young men killed in Port Said was a student at the university where I teach. His name was Omar Mohsen and he was due to graduate this spring. I have seen images of young men and women beaten and killed before, but this one hits especially close to home. He could have been one of my own students, sitting in my classroom one day and brutally killed the next.

I remember the poem by Neruda I saw scribbled on a piece of paper in a field hospital in Tahrir Square last November: ‘You can crush the flowers, but you can’t delay spring.’ This one is for Omar. I draw it quickly and cut it out of a piece of cardboard. It is the first time I have been to the street to spray a stencil in broad daylight. It does not matter anymore whether I get caught or not. I am so angry. I feel sorry for the mothers who thought they were sending their children off to a peaceful football match and have welcomed them back in coffins. I do not feel that I deserve to live anymore. I spray the poem and my other No stencils around the al-Ahly club, on the walls in the small al-Andalus Street off Mahmoud Mokhtar Street and in Tahrir all around the square. I am not alone in my anger and grief. Mass demonstrations are breaking out everywhere.

**

Since the Port Said massacre, I have become obsessed with being on the street. Once or twice a week I put my daughters to bed, fetch my stencils and spray cans and go out. In my pockets I have my keys, my phone, my ID and a little bit of money. I use the same backpack I used for my daughters’ diapers and milk bottles when they were younger. The bag is ideal because it has a lot of pockets and can fit two spray cans on the side where it used to hold milk bottles. The pockets in my cargo pants fit another two spray cans and a few more fit inside the bag. I make a cardboard folder for my stencils. The screensaver on my phone is my daughters’ picture. If I get caught this will be the first image on my phone anyone will see should they try to search it. Before leaving the house I always make sure I am wearing a clean pair of underwear. I don’t understand why, but I think that if I get killed I want my underwear to be clean. It is a very curious thought that in the face of death what I am most concerned about is the banality of my personal hygiene. I have cut my hair very short. I don’t have time to wash it with all the street work I’m doing now, my teaching, housekeeping and looking after the girls. It is also one less thing to worry about. And if someone tries to catch me on the street, they can’t grab me by my hair.

26. Calligraphic verse from the Quran on barrier wall, by ...

Table of contents

• FrontCover Page
• Title
• Copyright
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• Rooms in an Imagined Museum (25 January to 11 February 2011)
• The Calligrapher’s Headline (12 February 2011)
• A State of Democratic Infancy (February to October 2011)
• A Thousand Times No (November to December 2011)
• First Anniversary (January to March 2012)
• The Candidates (March to June 2012)
• The New Pharaoh (July to December 2012)
• The Children of Asyut (January to June 2013)
• Rebel, Cat! (June 2013)
• Stealing the Dream (June 2013)
• A Conversation (July to October 2013)
• Ten Years On: May You See Days Better than Mine
• Bibliography
• Endnotes