Muhammad Nour ElKhairy is a Palestinian filmmaker, film programmer, researcher and educator from Jordan, currently based in Tio'tia:ke (Montréal). ElKhairy holds a BA in Communication Studies and Humanities, and an MFA in Studio Arts: Film Production at Concordia University.
His single and multi-channel fiction and non-fiction moving image works are driven by an interest in the legacies of colonial, political, and economic power within cultural institutions, and in how these forces shape aesthetics and form. He works with hybrid forms and fragmented non-linear visual languages to address narratives that have been erased, subjugated or sublimated by colonial violence.
Central to his practice is the screen, not just as an ideological device embedded within systems of domination, but also a stage upon which the self is performed. It is here that the personal, once made visible, reveals its politics: showing how legacies of colonization and inherited structures of power inscribe themselves on individual lives, and how individual experiences, in turn, illuminate broader cultural, social, and political realities.
My practice performs an autopsy on political images, tracing how storytelling, media, and moving image culture have been used both as tools of colonial power and as potential sites of resistance. Here, form is not merely a vessel for content but an active field of struggle.
His work has been presented internationally at festivals and galleries including Moma PS1, Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival, Kaunas IFF, Toronto Palestine Film Festival, Go Short - Nijmegen, Dazibao, The Plumb, Oeil de Poisson, Plein Sud and the Cinematheque Quebecoise.
As a film editor, ElKhairy believes in a collaborative and open work process based on experimentation and analytical investigation, utilising this process to harness the full potential of the relationship between form and content in support of the message.