‘Someone Chewing’: Lawrence Abu Hamdan listens in on the ‘lords of sound’

BEIRUT — The entire south-facing hall at Sfeir-Semler Gallery’s Karantina space has been turned over to Lawrence Abu Hamdan’s 2025 installation “Planned Obsolescence.” The piece deploys 10 old-school television sets facing west to greet visitors as they enter. The screens flicker with different video footage, each frozen in place. None of the 10 unmoving images presents a clear or aesthetically pleasing tableau. At times, a building facade, a rural or urban landscape may be inferred from the fixed swarm of pixels.“Planned Obsolescence” is one of the seven works, most dating from 2024-25, in Abu Hamdan’s exhibition “Someone Chewing,” the Amman-born artist’s second solo at Sfeir-Semler’s Karantina location. The researcher, filmmaker and “Private Ear” (aka activist) has been investigating audio for over a decade, and his work has been...