At a time when social and geopolitical upheaval has prompted the mass displacement of people across the globe, Imran Perretta’s film ’15 days’ examines how the face of the refugee has been dehumanised, often anonymised and frequently demonised.
’15 days’ is inspired by the time that Imran spent in Calais with former inhabitants of the refugee camp known as the Jungle, who are now living in surrounding woodland. The title of the piece is not a measure of the length of his stay there but rather the alias of one of the people who he became friends with, and a comment on how time slips by when waiting indeterminately, in the hope of a new and better life.
Perretta pictures this state of limbo through the otherworldly medium of the computer-generated image, creating a compelling video which captures the intense emotions of living on the edge and brings them to the centre of our thoughts.
Imran Perretta’s ’15 days’ was commissioned for the Jerwood/FVU Awards 2018: ‘Unintended Consequences’, a collaboration between Jerwood Charitable Foundation and Film and Video Umbrella. FVU is supported by Arts Council England. This exhibition is a collaborative project with the Centre for Migration Studies, University of Essex.
