Fig. (The Statue)

Archive: fig.

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Fig. (The Statue)

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Fig. (The Toppling)

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Fig. (Nationalisation)

President Nasser announced the nationalisation of the Suez Canal from a balcony of the Cotton Exchange in Alexandria. Implicit in this gesture was the nationalisation of the cotton trade and therefore the redundancy of the cotton exchange. Today there is a car park where the building once stood.

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Fig. (After de Lesseps)

In 1956, when President Nasser announced the nationalisation of the Suez Canal, the statue of Ferdinand de Lesseps, the French master-mind behind the canal, was toppled from its pedestal in Port Said at the entrance of the canal. The plinth remained empty until 2011, when, after the revolution an Egyptian Flag was planted on it. Meanwhile in a restaurant nearby, all the pictures adorning the walls show the statue of de Lesseps, opening up a dialogue between nostalgia, liberation and nationalism.