Discreet Violence

Photo provided by: Samia Henni, Discreet Violence

Samia Henni

Samia Henni is a historian of the built, destroyed, and imagined environments; assistant professor at Cornell University; and Albert Hirschman Chair (2021/22) at the Institute for Advanced Study (IMéRA) in Marseille. She is the author of the multi-award-winning Architecture of Counterrevolution: The French Army in Northern Algeria (gta Verlag, 2017, EN; Editions B42, 2019, FR), the editor of the volumes War Zones (gta Verlag, 2018) and Deserts Are Not Empty (Columbia Books on Architecture and the City, 2022), and the maker of exhibitions, such as Archives: Secret-Défense? (ifa-Gallery/ SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin, 2021), Housing Pharmacology (Manifesta 13, Marseille, 2020), and Discreet Violence: Architecture and the French War in Algeria (2017–2019; Zurich, Rotterdam, Berlin, Johannesburg, Paris, Prague, Ithaca, Philadelphia). Currently, she is working on an exhibition and a publication on the architecture of the French nuclear weapons testing sites in the Sahara.

Artist Statement

Exhibition at UVA Discreet Violence: Architecture and the French War in Algeria

March 21 - April 1, 2022

Bond House - UVA Democracy Initiative

On the 60th anniversary of Algeria's independence, join the Democracy Initiative's Nau Lab for a Touchstones of Democracy conversation with architectural historian Samia Henni and UVA professor Sheila Crane at 1:00 PM on Friday, March 25. Henni and Crane will discuss questions of material violence, archives, and democracy explored in Henni's exhibition, "Discreet Violence: Architecture and the French War in Algeria."

The exhibition is hosted by UVA's Democracy Initiative at the Bond House and is open for individuals and classes to visit from Monday, March 21 - Friday, April 1 from 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM. If possible, please connect with Frances Capaccio (fcc3tt@virginia.edu) of the Democracy Initiative to coordinate your visit.

This event and exhibition are supported by the Nau Lab and UVA's History, French, and Middle Eastern & South Asian Languages and Cultures departments.

The Nau Lab's Touchstones of Democracy series supports conversations on key events, places, texts, and thinkers that help us understand the history and principles of democracy.

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