This March, Ibraaz launched its public programme in partnership with Art Dubai. Dubbed Ibraaz Talks, this is a series of specially curated conversations with artists, curators and writers at Art Dubai. Each participant was invited to respond to a particular issue or keyword that they felt in some way addressed formal and conceptual issues affecting contemporary visual culture. Each session acts as a discursive mapping of ideas, spanning a broad gamut from Egyptian literature to modern warfare.

In the following conversation, artist Basim Magdy discusses his conception of science fiction through the lenses of the Egyptian literary figure, Ragy Enayat. Magdy also discusses apocalyptic landscapes, the materiality of film and a dream scenario for his own work of science fiction. Magdy also talks about the project he presented at Art Dubai, Investigating the Color Spectrum of a Post-Apocalyptic Future Landscape: a slide-projected sequence of images photographed on the arid, volcanic island of Lanzarote.

Basim Magdy was born in Assiut, Egypt in 1977. He currently lives and works in Basel, Switzerland and Cairo. His work has recently appeared in La Triennale: Intense Proximity, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, curated by Okwui Enwezor; Newtopia: the State of Human Rights, Mechelen, Belgium, curated by Katerina Gregos; Sharjah Biennial, Sharjah, UAE, curated by Yuko Hasegawa; Future Generation Art Prize, PinchukArtCenter, Kiev, Ukraine, curated by Bjorn Geldhof; and in a screening program at the Film Festival Rotterdam, curated by Omar Kholeif and Peter van Hoof. Selected upcoming shows in 2013 include the 13th Istanbul Biennial, Turkey, curated by Fulya Erdemci; Biennale Jogja XII, Indonesia, curated by Agung Hujatnikajennong and Sarah Rifky; Picha Recontre, Lubumbashi Biennial, DR Congo, curated by Elvira Dyangani Ose; and Dissident Futures at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, curated by Betti-Sue Hertz.

www.basimmagdy.com