The Empty Seat at the Table

The Empty Seat at the Table, reflections on the work of Palestine Hosting Society | Lecture Performance by Mirna Bamieh The empty seat at the table, reflections on the work of Palestine Hosting Society. Lecture performance, and eating together. This lecture-performance weaves together storytelling, archival research, and acts of radical hospitality. Emerging from Mirna Bamieh's long-term projects Palestine Hosting Society and Sour Things, it reflects on food as a site of disappearance and endurance. Speaking from a place of distance, Bamieh revisits her first and last research trips in Palestine before the war, tracing how recipes, lands, and gestures vanish under occupation yet persist through memory and care. The performance blends live narration, projected images, sound fragments, and moments of collective food sharing. Absence becomes a site of inspection with the host who cannot be present. Through this constellation of storytelling and sensory experience, Bamieh invites audiences to consider how cooking, preserving, and remembering can open a space for mourning, resilience, and the imagination of a different future. There will be a simple trey with print bread, Gazan Dukka, olive oil, Freshly made Labneh and Olives, will be shared as an offering to end the lecture performance with. This Lecture performance was originally commissioned and performed at Tate Modern as part of Ancestral Knowledges Symposium 14-15 November 2025. Mirna Bamieh is a Palestinian artist whose practice explores the politics of disappearance, memory and Palestinian food culture. Blending food, storytelling and socially engaged art, she founded Palestine Hosting Society in 2018, a live art project that seeks to preserve traditional Palestinian food practices and recipes. Her ongoing project Sour Things explores fermentation through installations, sound, ceramics, drawing and video. Her work has been presented at institutions including Tate Modern, Sharjah Biennial, MoMA PS1 and Kunsthaus Zürich.