Origin: Norway Palestine | Documentary | Director: Jumana Manna | 12 minutes

---

A Sketch of Manners (Alfred Roch's Last Masquerade)

full title: a sketch of manners (Alfred Roch's last masquerade)

Jumana Manna 2012 | Creative Documentary | 12 min

Alfred Roch, Jaffa's biggest landowner and member of the Palestinian
National League, was a politician with a bohemian panache. In 1942, at the
height of WWII, he threw what turned out to be the last masquerade ball in
Palestine. Inspired by an archival photograph taken the event, A Sketch of
Manners recreates and reimagines an unconventional bon vivant aspect of
Palestine's lost pre-1948 past. A multilayered work that reflects on the
history of photography, notions of modernity within the region, and the
role of artifice and farce in society.

Winner First Prize, Young Artist of the Year Award 2012, the AM Qattan Foundation, London

Full feature: https://player.vimeo.com/video/65088960

---

View trailer