In September 2026, Peer presents Cemetery of Martyrs, a major new co-commission by Beirut and London-based artist, Dala Nasser produced in collaboration with Nottingham Contemporary and KM21 The Hague, Netherlands. Nasser’s new body of work comprises an immersive sonic installation incorporating a canopy of dyed and marked fabrics layered and draped over a site-specific wooden structure.
As an artist exploring history, displacement and community through a relationship with abstraction and alternative forms of image-making, Nasser integrates sound, performance and film in her work, but remains quintessentially a painter, working with the medium’s most elementary materials: fabric, pigments, stretcher bars and mark making.
Cemetery of Martyrs departs from Nasser’s past works that explore the cultural and political histories of Southern Lebanon and wider West Asia; a region imprinted with the remnants of ancient cultures, landscapes and geology. Whereas Nasser’s previous work has drawn on historic subjects and sites, ranging from the tragic love story of mortal Adonis and Goddess Aphrodite, the 600–400 BCE tomb of King Hiram, or most recently, three tombs of Noah in Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan, her new commission transforms Peer’s exhibition space into a symbolic graveyard.
Nasser’s new body of work is the outcome of over two years of research and field trips, guided by conversations with historians, her communities and collaborators. Using the process of frottage (the technique of taking a rubbing from an uneven surface), Nasser has worked in many geographic contexts to collect charcoal grave rubbings from the grave stones and sites of seminal artists, writers, poets, filmmakers, historians and journalists from across Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, Egypt, Jordan, the United Kingdom and the United States, who all, at some stage of their lives, spent time in Beirut, Lebanon.
The resulting collection of graves represent the lives of cultural figures from the mid nineteenth century (specifically The Nahda, a cultural and intellectual Arab Renaissance movement) to the present day, who all used their art as a tool to fight for independence and freedom in times of political dominance and occupation. Each life represented in the installation, has shaped – through their own artistic and intellectual work – the notion of true sovereignty in Western Asia.
Within the installation, Nasser layers black and green mourning fabrics that she has dyed and marked with earthen elements, such as shells, seeds, ash, and crushed malachite, amongst cyan blue and charcoal-marked fabrics. Charcoal rubbings transcribe the surfaces of known graves, while cyanotype treated fabrics act as a visual representation of those whose graves are unreachable or unknown by featuring the person’s name transcribed in Arabic in various scales and legibility. An accompanying audio work permeates throughout Nasser’s installation. Composing field recordings from the sites of the graves and cemeteries visited by Nasser during the production of the work, the audio presence is sporadic and subtle; linking the realms of the living and the dead.
Reflecting on the challenge of interpreting the extreme and unceasing violence of the present moment, Cemetery of Martyrs invites audiences to contemplate the endurance of cultural sovereignty and to reckon with their own role in forging new pathways of thought and action. Nasser’s cemetery creates a collective space to gather and hold the voices and legacies of people who were steadfast in their commitment to freedom; a graveyard to mourn, learn, and reaffirm the power of culture, art and humanity to connect us to histories of resistance and renewal.
Nasser’s exhibition is accompanied by a series of events as part of Peer’s Talks, Events and Workshops programme. Cemetery of Martyrs is part of Peer’s 2026 Programme, which examines themes including the construction of place, sovereignty and community and includes solo exhibitions by artists, Leah Clements, Okiki Akinfe and Ceidra Moon Murphy.
Biography:
Dala Nasser (b. 1990, Tyre) lives and works in London and Beirut. Selected exhibitions include: Xíloma. MCCCLXXXVI, Kunsthalle Basel; Aichi Triennale 2025: A Time Between Ashes and Roses, Nagoya, Japan; Flesh Flowers, Aishti Foundation, Beirut, Lebanon (all 2025); Adonis River, Renaissance Society, Chicago, USA; Red in Tooth, Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne, Germany; Whitney Biennial 2024: Even Better Than the Real Thing, Whitney Museum of Art, New York; Diriyah Biennale 2024: After Rain, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (all 2024); Time spent without its flow, V.O Curations, London and 58th Carnegie International, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh (all 2022).
Supporters:
Cemetery of Martyrs has been produced with support from the Henry Moore Foundation.
Cemetery of Martyrs at Peer is supported by Cockayne Grants for the Arts. Headline Supporters: Fahad Mayet and Lorenzo Leviste. With thanks to May Calil and the Dala Nasser Supporters Circle.
Peer’s 2026 Programme is supported by the Paul and Louise Cooke Endowment.
Peer is an Arts Council England, National Portfolio Organisation and is supported by Hackney Council through a Voluntary Sector lease.
Peer Ambassadors 2026 is supported by Hackney Council Community Fund and NCEL Collaborative/Compass Wellbeing CIC. With thanks to Great Art.
Cemetery of Martyrs is produced and commissioned by Nottingham Contemporary in collaboration with KM21 The Hague, Netherlands and Peer, London.
