THE FERDAWS SQUARE

2003: After Saddam's Fall in 2023 a group of artists, intellectuals, and activists started a bus trip to Baghdad to Firdaws Square. We went by coach during the day; we reached Firdaws Square. There was the famous sculpture of Saddam that was destroyed during the opening of Baghdad; the American soldiers were everywhere, and the surroundings of the place were full of tension, even though we were young and weren't aware of the complications of the situation. But in the place which, for most of us, was the first time to see or to visit, it was something strange because we were following the news on an hourly basis and the place was familiar on TV, but that image becoming real was a strange realisation. But we knew later that the reality of the place was also the surface of what was happening, but still we laid down a big canvas on the floor and started to paint as a way to say we are building the same imagination for the future Iraq, and we started to paint as well on the remains of the sculpture; the children who were around were also invited to paint the canvas with us. Even one of the artists later told us that they took inspiration from this event to build a sculpture on top of the place in a freer, more modernised style to show that the future of art in Iraq will change from building multiple images of Saddam to a new art environment that provides freedom to individuals and freedom of expression, which, of course, during Saddam's time, every aspect of art was observed and monitored harshly; of course, later even the sculpture was removed from the place.