In the video Reserved (2006), Bani Abidi (Pakistani, b.1971) depicts a city at a standstill, its residents awaiting the arrival of an unspecified dignitary. Schoolchildren line a roadside with flags in hand; cars idle behind traffic barricades; an empty auditorium slowly fills; tense bureaucrats prepare for imminent political pageantry. Meanwhile, a motorcade winds through the streets. Though the work appears to be a documentary, it is actually choreographed, drawing on Abidi’s childhood memories of waiting for governmental ceremonies as a schoolgirl in Karachi, Pakistan. Reserved captures the eerie quiet that can accompany authoritarianism, the role that customary rituals play in fostering nationalism, and, ultimately, the gestures of communal solidarity to which such historical moments give rise.
