Asher.Zax, the duo of sound artists Meira Asher and Eran Sachs, create sound-text pieces which engage in extreme sonic and emotional gestures in order to explore radical thought and action. Over the past few years they have devoted their collaborative work to an artistic and critical examination of Colonialism, its place in their own lives (they are both living in Palestine48/Israel) and the myriad of ways by which it plagues the lives of everyone around the world.
Working with unstable analogue electronics and voice, the results of this research are now collected in a 3-TAPE SET titled ‘The Catastrophe’, released by the Jerusalem-alQuds based label Raash Records. Recorded between 2017 and 2022, The Catastrophe assembles the two previously released cassettes; ’The Last shall be First’ and ‘Colonial War and Mental Disorders’ of this cycle with the new tape ‘Cisterns’ – a third and concluding one.
The Catastrophe – Al-Nakba – is a term used specifically to refer to the destruction and occupation of Palestinian homeland and the displacement of the majority of Palestinians by the Israeli state. The word, and the act of, Nakba resonates from 1948 to the present day. The Catastrophe continues. It also expands its reach to infect present-day Israeli society.
Colonialism is a disease of reality itself. The disease facilitates a rearrangement of reality according to distorted principles. We are frequently not able to understand, challenge, or even recognise these smuggled principles. Failure to recognise is no excuse, however. Our passivity allows the disease to spread. And thus the Empires are sustained, are expanded, and are even eulogized.
