Artists I

Video installation in two projections (ideal size for presentation of 10m x 2.81m) with stereo sound in two independent channels, "Labour" was entirely produced and filmed in Paris during the year of 2005. This piece focuses on the development and the history of labour work in France. It portrays how a considerably high percentage of immigrant people have their private life-stories subscribed in the French history through their working contribution to this nation. During the whole twentieth century up to now, most of the proletarian work in France was done by immigrant people from North and Central Africa, and from Asia. Researching and filming some of this labour work still widely done up to date in Paris and the daily life of these immigrants, Dias & Riedweg encounter a tailor from Senegal, an Algerian constructor who helped building Les Halles, a Tunisian world champion boxer, as well as an Italian and a Japanese chief who introduced their gastronomic culture. All of those are old people who have immigrated and worked for their life time in Paris, over the past fourty years. The cameras go closer and closer into the subject of labour itself, revealing much of the sounds, atmospheres, colours and textures of these old people's work and the hidden daily real life, which constitutes much of the contemporary lifestyle of the international city of Paris. "Labeur" by Dias & Riedweg proposes another understanding skills of the globalized world in Europe.

Commissioned by Festival d'Automne à Paris and Espace Le Plateau, Collection of the Fond Regional d'art Contemporain - FRAC Ile de France

Source: Foundation Gwangju Biennale