Dear Laila, you are five now and have started to ask me where i grew up, and why we can’t go home. This is me trying to give you an answer.

The seeds of this award-winning immersive experience were planted when artist Basel Zaraa’s five-year-old daughter, Laila, began to ask him about his childhood home, Al Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus. Unable to take her there, Zaraa decided he would bring the place to her.

Dear Laila shares the Palestinian experience of displacement and resistance through the story of one family, exposing how war and exile infiltrate the everyday and the domestic. In this intimate, interactive installation for one, we explore a model of the home Zaraa grew up in. Open drawers. Leaf through photo albums. Look at the pictures on the wall. Reflect on the stories hidden in plain sight.

Dear Laila speaks to joy, family, and the beauty of community.

Production Credits

A Basel Zaraa Production, presented by PuSh International Performing Arts Festival, Boca del Lupo, and Pandemic Theatre

About Basel Zaraa

Basel is a UK-based Palestinian artist whose work – consisting mainly of installations – uses the senses to bring audiences closer to experiences of exile and the search for identity. His previous works include “As Far As My Fingertips Take Me”, in collaboration with Tania El Khoury, which was awarded at the 2019 Bessie Awards. The work is an encounter through a gallery wall between an audience member and a refugee; their arms touch without seeing each other. The refugee marks the audience by drawing on their arm; the audience listens to those who have recently challenged border discrimination.

Production History

January 2024 • PuSh International Performing Arts Festival • Vancouver, BC

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