Essays
29 January 2026
Still life, after the majlis
The objects of hospitality, photographed once the guests have gone, hold a particular and unsentimental light.
The dallah, the dates, the cups: the still life of the majlis is so familiar it risks becoming a postcard. Photographed after the room empties, it recovers its weight.
What is kept is not the ritual but its residue, the light of a room that has just been used, which is a harder and truer thing to picture.