(14)
Untitled (the wars in Lebanon)
HD video, color, sound
10:00 min.
Video, 2018
Voice of Sarah Lily Yassine
With footage contributed by Giovanni Khoury, Hanno Stecher, Krystel Medawar Khoury, Johanna Breiding, Joshua Mosley, Jason S. Hage, Nicole Massad, Sarah Lily Yassine, Shereen Sheikhhassan, Stephanie Richa
Commissioned by Grand Union
With gratitude to Sharon Hayes
Transcript
[A short video essay consisting of cellphone video footage sent by friends and strangers from Beirut and greater Lebanon. The footage alternates between vertical and horizontal, and ranges in length from a few seconds to several minutes. The video opens with a vertical shot reminiscent of a first-person video game—leading viewers through a dirt road overlooking the Mediterranean, sun hitting the lens as we eventually reach a decaying concrete structure at the edge of the sea. As we walk through the rubble of the structure, finally reaching an ocean view, the video and sound go black and silent—a female voice with a soft accent begins in English. A collage of videos plays as she narrates: a shaky lens of sunbeam and palm trees, laundry drying overhead in the wind, driving along the city highway, a group of young people playing soccer in an emptied out dirt field. As videos shift from one to the next, they are punctuated by a pause of black screen, the narrator continuing to speak, or at times pausing for the introduction of a new scene. The work ends as it began, with the waves of the Mediterranean crashing against a rocky shore.]