To Give a Voice to the Refugees!
Last! Supper.
Art project: Installation/Performance
„The people who come to us are looking for integration. They did not do criminal acts but they had to flee from the delinquent without mercy in their country, where they will be send back.“
Sixty people looking for Asylum became famous in a sorrowful way in the winter of 2012/13 due to their marsh from Traiskirchen to the Votivkirche in Vienna and its occupation followed by a hungerstrike.
For years now their protest tries to put the focus on the inhuman treatment of political asylum seekers. From the politicians side has been no change. Much more – their voices disappear in the battle of political ideologies. The human being and his destiny is easily forgotten. We have to give back to the refugees their voice and the focus has to again be on the individual. We have to steer towards human integration- and asylum politics.
Apart from the political protest the language of art has the possibility to eliminate prejudice and to mobilize the Austrians and the media to communicate a thoughtful, respectful thinking.
In the summer of 2013 ago eight refugees were deported. Pakistan is, in the Austrian mind, a save country. Seven of them disappeared, and the eight is struggling for his survival trying to escape his pursuers. The remaining refugees from the Votivkirche are now in the Servitenkloster but not for long anymore. They are human beings like us and they wish to have the right to be heard. With their stories they can be part of our history and society.
We want to give those refugees their voice back in an exhibition, where we invite six refugees to a symbolic Last! Supper., six others will be only represented with their name tag as they have already been deported. The visitors, the politicians and the media have to ask themselves if they want to be the liberator or the trigger of the refugee-crisis. In six interviews, that presents these people in life-size will be shown on dozens of public places in Vienna, usually reserved for advertising.
The project gained widespread media attention and was also shown at Kunsthalle Wien, MUSA, Essl Museum, The Brno House of Arts and the Art Gallery of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Sini Coreth – Curator [sinicoreth.at]
Johannes Raimann – Photographer [johannes-raimann.at]
Dominic Spitaler – Filmmaker [www.ostblok.org]