Palimpsests
- AboutPalimpsests, 2017
Part 4 of Unconformities project
Video HD, 12min 40sec The journey begins when the artists join engineer Philippe Fayad on a construction site, observing core samples extracted from the subsoil to be studied before being discarded. Stored in wooden boxes, these samples reveal hidden layers of history – from contemporary traces to deep geological time – exposing unconformities, gaps, and discontinuities in the sequence of time. To the artists, these cores resemble raw film reels awaiting narration. With the help of experts like archaeologist Hadi Choueri, buried stories gradually emerge, pulling us into the vertigo of time. Palimpsests captures both the extraction of core samples and archaeological excavations, uncovering urban histories lying just meters beneath our feet. History appears as a dizzying palimpsest, where tireless cycles of building, destruction, and reconstruction blend different epochs together. - Other Installations
To explore these temporal layers, the artists mix drone footage with microscopic images, wide shots with intense close-ups, and fast cuts with long sequences. This contrast creates a way of seeing that surpasses human vision, crafting a representation of time at once concrete and fantastical. Palimpsests offers a vertical and horizontal scopic drift where tense interactions evoke ruptures but also regenerations, fluctuating from the past to our troubled present.
