From September 2024, broadcast on R22 webradio des arts et du commun of The Emotional Last Mile, a series of podcasts initiated by Benjamin Seror in the context of the solo exhibition Fascination at CRAC Alsace.
CRAC Alsace invites you to listen to Le dernier kilomètre émotionnel (The Emotional Last Mile), a series of podcasts initiated by Benjamin Seror in conversation with Deena Abdelwahed, Hajer Ben Boubaker, Joakim Bouaziz and Karim Kattan, authors, musicians, DJs and historians who question the role that emotions play in their own practice.
From November 2021 to February 2022, Benjamin Seror presented Fascination at CRAC Alsace, a joyful and gleaming exhibition of sad songs. Fascination mobilized music and song as active tools that allow us to inhabit spaces of intimacy, to be moved, to be spurred into action in our daily lives. What is it about music that moves us so? How can it transport us to places of such intense emotional experience? The podcast series The Last Emotional Mile was developed in the wake of these experiences.
The goosebumps that run down his spine when he hears the lyrics of a song, the wavering and the silence that follow, the evocation of memories—this is what Benjamin Seror thinks about so often: he names this shiver The Last Emotional Mile.
Karim Kattan
This conversation with Karim Kattan was recorded in July 2022 on one of the hottest days on record on this planet. We publish it today, two years later. Since then, the situation in Israel-Palestine has deteriorated dramatically, and in January 2024 the International Court of Justice warned of the risk of genocide in Gaza.
Karim Kattan is a Palestinian writer born in Jerusalem. His first novel in French, Le Palais des deux collines, was published by Éditions Elyzad in 2021. His English-language work has appeared in numerous publications, including The Paris Review, The Baffler, Strange Horizons, The Funambulist, +972 Magazine and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science-Fiction.
Deena Abdelwahed
After starting out in a jazz band and making multiple appearances in the Tunisian electronic music scene, Tunisian producer and DJ Deena Abdelwahed moved to France in 2016. Her musical explorations reappropriate the elements that make up the diversity of Arab music, drawing inspiration from electronic dance music influenced by Club music and today's avant-garde, experimental scenes. Deena Abdelwahed released her second album Jbal Rrsas (InFiné) in September 2023.
This conversation with Deena Abdelwahed was recorded in October 2022.
Joakim Bouaziz
Known by his stage name Joakim, Joakim Bouaziz is a musician and member of the French electronic music scene. A compulsive record collector, Joakim's encyclopedic, passionate approach to music is reflected in his DJ sets and his often unclassifiable music. Since 2007, he has also collaborated with numerous artists, including Camille Henrot and Xavier Veilhan.
This conversation with Joakim Bouaziz was recorded in March 2023.
Hajer Ben Boubaker
Hajer Ben Boubaker is a French-Tunisian historian, independent researcher, sound documentarist and author. She specializes in the history of Arab music and the cultural history of North African immigration to France. In 2018, she created Vintage Arab, the first French-language podcast devoted to Arab music from the Maghreb and the Middle East, which approaches this music from a socio-historical perspective.
This conversation with Hajer Ben Boubaker was recorded in April 2023.
These conversations were mixed by Victor Donati, transcribed by Héloïse Prax and translated by Thomas Patier.
