It’s All Real, 2014
Part 8 of
Scams (I must first apologise) project
Video Installation
During the filming of A Letter Always Reaches its Destination and The Rumor of the World, and meeting the various amateur actors, the artists encountered people with incredible life histories, linked by their double cultures, worlds, and temporalities.
They are grasped by an extraterritorial dimension that echoes the virtual world, globalized through the Internet. Beyond the scams that they produce, the stories told in these scams reflect displacement, mobility, and global events, oddly evoking their personal stories, made complex by economic or political turmoil.
They have no choice but to leave their country; they are predominantly emigrants, in temporary exile, seeking refuge in Lebanon or a job, hoping for a better life. They come from all over the world and are often laborers or domestic workers. Some of them receive social security, others don’t. Some are workers’ children. Born in Lebanon, they struggle to get legal papers and move around freely.
The video installation It’s all Real retraces some of these encounters, following them in their daily lives, to give a voice to these barely perceptible silhouettes, to narrate the story of the invisible.
With Omar, Younès, Tamara, Fidel and Adib one sees the parallel world that they live in, and the floating identities that they inherit. The video installations in which they appear are like documents dispersed in the exhibition, confronting fictional characters with real people. Like the scams, they comment on the state of the world and contemporary history.
Installations for It’s All Real: 1. OMAR & YOUNES 2. FIDEL 3. TAMARA 4. ADIB 5. SACHA 
