An artist is at work in The Painter (2013)—uniformed elegantly in paint-splattered shoes and work-wear—yet another unseen artist is observing, directing, framing off-screen. Nashashibi films more than the work itself, and large, muscular, abstract paintings emerge from a combination of energetic and economic gestures. With unflinching pragmatism, the painter pushes and pours muted viscous matter, surprisingly, with a mop. Eventually, the focus shifts to a drawing of a smiling girl atop a horse—tail raised, issuing a pile of dung. It’s by the painter’s daughter. In The Deliveryman (2013), a package arrives in the office. A generic white male arts administrator speaks in English, and a hurried DHL worker responds in Flemish. Yet communication occurs less via spoken language than embodied signals—a scrawled signature, codified behavioral cues, context, uniforms, and so on. Upon this double receipt, however, the deliveryman breaks uniform and a different expression crystallizes in the courtyard.