What to Do When You Cannot Hold a Mountain Between Your Arms? is not just a question but the title of a photography project by Ebrahim Bahaa-Eldin that explores the fragile balance between memory, urban development, and our relationship with the landscape.

Through a series of images taken between 2021 and 2024, the photographer guides us on a visual reflection on the concept of space and belonging, positioning himself between two opposing forces: care and conquest. The photographs document places such as Boulaq Ad-Dakrour, Al-Waraq, Haranyya, and Al-Haram—fragments of an urban landscape marked by transformation and the policies of development and conservation. What does it mean to try to hold onto a place? Is it possible to own it, to fully understand it, or must we accept its inevitable change?

Through evocative shots such as Home Inside-Out (2021), Dusting Off (2021), and Intrusion (2022), the project examines how the environment shapes our identity and how, at times, we are powerless spectators of irreversible change. The spaces depicted become metaphors for a broader sense of loss, where the desire to preserve collides with the reality of transformation.

The very title suggests a sense of powerlessness: when faced with forces greater than ourselves, we can only walk along the slopes of these “mountains,” observing the shadows they cast over our lives. Or, we can seek new ways to inhabit the landscape, finding a balance between memory and progress.

With a sensitivity that blends intimacy and social analysis, What to Do When You Cannot Hold a Mountain Between Your Arms? is an invitation to reflect on our connection with the world around us—a world that changes, transforms, and sometimes slips through our fingers.