During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the Iraq National Museum was looted. Upwards of 15,000 artefacts were stolen and destroyed after the US army failed to protect the institution. Iconic pieces such as the Warka Vase, along with statues, tablets and seals were lost and damaged.
 
During the looting, the Tell Asmar figures watching the distressing raid unfold miraculously remained untouched. In this installation, Al-Khafaji displays a copy of a female idol from the Tell Asmar hoard, displayed as a fractured artefact, as much of the ancient collection around her had become.
 
Opposite stands a British war-issued helmet, projecting the artist's personal comprehensions of her locational home invading her ancestral one. This contrast frames the persistent struggles surrounding national identity faced by the Iraqi people living in the United Kingdom, both during the invasion and now.
 
The visual parallels between the objects strengthen the contexts provided by the painting, creating triadic narratives. Through museum-like displays, the work encourages observations of the objects as symbols of the past, despite the continued struggles for Iraqis. It highlights that invading nations have since moved on, while Iraqis continue to face the consequences of the invasion.  

‘Fertile Crescent’ explores identity and displacement, curating the losses and complexities endured by those most directly affected by the 2003 Iraqi invasion.

Nahraine Al-Khafaji (b. 2002) is a London born Iraqi-British artist, raised between England and the Middle East. This contrast in culture informs her study of ancient Iraqi history and its importance in the modern western world she resides in.
 
Her practice explores the fragility of history especially after catastrophes. Where events were documented in enduring materials only to be later found destroyed and unintelligible. She represents this through fragmented forms and removal of paint from laboured paintings, echoing the erasure of information in our humanity's timeline. This becomes more distressing to Al-Khafaji when it is preventable. Events such as the infamous Baghdad Museum lootings and rebel attacks on archaeological sites are direct consequences of recent conflicts, with history becoming a target. She struggles with the fact that they become endangered once unearthed and secured in museums. Al-Khafaji questions the preservation of her own heritage, asking why Iraqi history is arguably safer when hidden and buried.
 
Viewers cannot fully grasp exactly what Al-Khafaji speaks through her paintings. They are encouraged to push further to make sense of them, while being forced to fill the uncertainty with personal narratives. They can never be fully comprehended as the histories are incompletely documented.