Every Subtle Gesture Casts a Shadow on the Future invites viewers to explore the delicate balance between the familiar and the unknown. The works avoid fixed meanings, offering parts of stories and emotions that change with each viewer’s memories and interpretations. They encourage reflection on how we create meaning in a divided world.
In his latest exhibition, Basim Magdy revisits Every Subtle Gesture (2012–2016), a text-based photographic series. Known for his paintings, films, and lens-based works, he presents a collection of photographs, both old and new.
He began his photographic journey during his first travels outside of Egypt. During these travels, he photographed snapshots as he stumbled upon unfamiliar landscapes, knowing he would never visit them again. Shooting these unfamiliar territories over the course of eight years soon became a natural, intuitive, and almost cathartic experience. His idea was simple: to create a body of work where he could detach himself from the memories and circumstances concerning these places.
This exhibition features over 50 photographs from the original Every Subtle Gesture series, which totals 100 works. Viewed in a single-lined sequence, the images are interrupted by new photographs displayed in a completely different format. Through this disruption, Magdy offers a fresh assessment of his stories, reconstructing the series within today’s social climate and exploring how conversations have evolved—or remained the same.
Usually, an image’s message accompanied by a caption has a fixed narrative. Here, Magdy takes the opposite approach: his use of text bears a subtle connection to his imagery. This may align with a lineage of photographers who have challenged the connection between text and image. Duane Michals, for instance, has used handwritten captions to create fragmented narratives that move beyond the literal meanings of his photographs.
Magdy, however, invites the viewers to engage with their interpretations of meaning. In some cases, the text presents a loose narrative referencing society as a collective and individuals through pronouns like “I,” “She,” “He,” and “They.” Another artist, Sophie Calle combines her photographs with deeply personal or seemingly unrelated stories, using the interplay of text and image to explore memory and identity. Magdy, however, uses cryptic text with his photographs to disrupt meaning, leaving it open to interpretation. This openness allows the viewer to decipher the work through their own concerns and experiences, both past and present.
Magdy’s images, though resembling snapshots, are unexpectedly cleanly framed and carefully balanced. There is a subtle focus on detail, textures, symmetry, and depth, creating compositions that are minimal yet hugely impactful. This work has the aesthetic qualities of the 1970s and 1980s c-print photographs, characterised by their curved corners, softly faded tones, and occasional colour degradation, evoking a nostalgic connection to family photo albums of that era. While many photographs feature straightforward compositions, often depicting the mundane, a few subtly incorporate double exposures, adding an ambiguous quality that contrasts with the otherwise grounded imagery.
The embossed silver text on the matted boards surrounding the framed pictures adds another layer of complexity to the works. This sleek, modern typography provides a striking contrast to the nostalgic feel of the photographs. On the other hand, the new works have the characteristics of film stills and subtitle-like texts imprinted on the images; these are lines borrowed from the scripts of his previous films, used in a very different context along with these new images. All shot on film, his processing technique is one he calls “film pickling”, using different household chemicals which erode the film, giving each image a unique finish.
By weaving together elements of the past and present, Magdy’s work draws viewers into an exploration of memory, emotion, and meaning. It offers a new way to think about the complexities of the present and how they shape our understanding of the future. It seamlessly shifts between moments of reflection and bursts of amusement. Using layered compositions, puzzling captions, and moments of quiet discomfort, Every Subtle Gesture Casts a Shadow on the Future encourages viewers to delve into what may seem unfamiliar yet recognisable.
Text by Sinem Yörük
