Maria Lusitano

Bidonville, 2002

Video, colour and sound, projection of variable dimensions, 5′

Bidonville is a project that was the result of a family moment: A few years ago Maria Lusitano discovered an old 8 mm film, done by her father when in his twenties. Reunited  with her family, without warning, she projected the film to them, and recorded their reactions. Her father was puzzled by the film that he had almost forgotten, and told us its story:  In 1967 he had gone to Paris on a study trip, and had visited his childhood friends and colleagues from elementary school. They lived in a slum in Champigni, France. Even though the french local community despised the way they lived, those portuguese were quite happy, and they told my father how they had a more comfortable life there, then the one they had experienced in Portugal. The project approaches the paradoxes, traumas, memories,  and different viewpoints of the migratory experience.