Exhibition

Radioactivities,
Radio Waves,
and Resistance.

Medium: print + sound installation

Tutors: 
Kamil Dalkir
Veronika Varga
Maïa Tellit Hawad










drawing 1_ Informational Immobility
drawing 2_ Navigational Immobility
drawing 3_ Navigational Mobility
drawing 4_ Legal Immobility: The initiation of an ashamur by Ag Ahar Elleli
drawing 5_ Legal Immobility


cassette 1_ album by Tinariwen
cassette 2_ Sahara FM & Kalangoo Radio broadcasting recording
cassette 3_ documentary environmental sounds (festival, funeral, wells, sword dance...)
cassette 4_ album by Etran de L'air
cassette 5_ official album by Tinariwen


INTRO


Sound transmission in the post-colonial life of the Tuareg community across the Sahara can be traced back to the 1960s, when Libyan military training camps became sites where cassette tapes and pirate radio stations first gained traction (Tinariwen). From the 1960s through the early 2000s, cassettes played a vital role in shaping a sonic culture of Tuareg solidarity, later transitioning to CDs and family-use radio receivers—often embedded in Toyotas and Land Cruisers (Mossa). In more recent times, Radio Waves have continued this legacy. These mediums have consistently resisted and challenged various forms of imposed immobility through their invisible, mobile transmissions.

Building on the understanding of how nomadic oral traditions have adapted under ongoing suppression, this
project engaged in a series of pirate taping practices—
as an alternative form of counter-cartography,
alongside drawn maps. These practices assert informal,
unauthorised, and intimate modes of knowledge as
legitimate tools of resistance—ones that can advocate
for nomadic justice beyond legal frameworks and
potentially influence policymakers.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT


A big thank you to my tutors, Kamil Dalkir and Veronika Varga, for their continuous
support and for helping shape my thinking throughout the academic year.
I am also grateful to the RS4 tutors, Christina Leigh Geros and Aslı Uludağ, for their
additional guidance and encouragement.
Special thanks to Godofredo Pereira and all the invited guests for their critical
feedback.
I deeply appreciate the conversations I've had with Tuareg individuals (including
those who preferred to remain anonymous), which have enriched this work. In
particular, I thank Maïa Tellit Hawad for her mentorship and Mossa Kidan for his
invaluable help with sonic history.
Also, thanks to the music work done by Tinariwen and Etran De L'Aïr, and poems
wrote by Mahmoudan Hawad and translate by Hélène Claudot-Hawad.
Finally, thank you to all my peers and friends for your constant support and
solidarity.

[drawing- legal immobility]
This story was collected in January 1990 and translated into French
by Hawad and Hélène Claudot, and access by Ava Xia in 2025.
Thanks to Kamil Dalkir for the suggestion to use personal stories as powerful evidence in crafting
counter-cartographies, as the first practice in this project.

[drawing- navigational immobility]
Inspired by chat with Maïa Tellit Hawad about experiencing
challenges going back home, both for visiting and research as
either a diaspora or scholar.
Inspired by Hélène Claudot-Hawad, who is a French anthropologist and professional Researcher
(Directrice de Recherche) at the National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS).

[drawing- informational immobility]
Inspired by a conversation with Assaleck Ag Tita during a field trip in Paris, where oral tradition
and encounter emerged as central modes of knowledge and information exchange.
Inspired by semi-structured conversation with Ibrahim
Diallo, a half-Tuareg and half-Fulani, and funder of Sahara
FM and Air Info, about lack of info accessibility in rural
Niger.
Supported by multiple conversations with Mossa, a talented and passionate Tuareg musician.
Inspiered by stories of exiled Tuareg musicians and bands, for example, Bombino and Tinariwen.
Thanks to sharings about mines and radio listening from a anonymous Tuared miner in Akokan.
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