Ningen, video installation, dimensions variable, 2006/2007.

 

Ningen is a multi-channel video installation made of the life stories of 50 Brazilian immigrants who live in Japan, and 50 Japanese immigrants who live in Brazil, told by themselves in both the Brazilian Portuguese and Japanese languages. This research project, situated between Art and Visual Anthropology, reveals the strange and often difficult conditions in which immigrants find themselves in relation to the culture of the places they have chosen to live, conditions that may question the singularity of their identities.

 

This work can be viewed in many ways. As a multi-channel video installation with video and sound, the cacophony of voices confuses the viewer, who initially cannot define the nationalities of the people talking in Portuguese and Japanese at the same time, on the screens. Through the headphones, the viewer has access to the story of each person, isolated from the confusing noise of the voices mixed in the space of the installation in the gallery.

 

© Frederico Câmara 2007.