In 'Exercises on Trials', Jasmina Metwaly and Philip Rizk delve into the construction of Egypt’s spectral legal reality. Through this upcoming moving image piece they visit the spaces in which these legal processes occur, studying legal microcosms in which the theatricality of law creates a system that determines how humans act within and without the given dogmas. It is through this theatrical realm that the rulers sustain their power. In their attempt to get under the skin of this legal labyrinth the artists will explore a variety of narrative planes. One approach will utilize a string of interviews with lawyers, who will relay the very day-to-day makeup of legal proceedings.

Rizk and Metwaly will also film with television camera persons and photographers who will shed light on the mundane technicalities that make up the visual renderings of a trial. Another element of the project is made up of the enacting of an alternate legal reality through an improvised mock trial scenario with students, employing techniques that engage with Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed and other and methods of improvisation and storytelling. Metwaly and Rizk will also study existing archival footage of testimonies and images including those archived by and at Mosireen, a media activism collective, of which the artists are members.  

Jasmina Metwaly is an artist and filmmaker based in Cairo. Her short essay film 'From Behind the Monument' premiered at the Berlinale in 2014. She co-curated the Imaginary School Program at Beirut Art Center in 2014/5.   

Philip Rizk is a filmmaker and writer based in Cairo. His audio installation 'A Colonial Landscape' accompanied Tobias Zielony’s photography exhibition of the same name at Fotohof, Salzburg in November 2015.    Metwaly and Rizk are members of the Mosireen video collective. Their feature film 'Out on the Street' premiered at the Berlinale 2015 and was part of the German Pavilion at the Venice Biennale 2015. They are currently working on a new project entitled 'Exercise on Trials'.