Page 74 - B-ALL 37 ENG

Since 2004, Francis Alÿs has been interested in the socio-political conflicts inherent in border areas, producing works in interstitial places such as the Strait of Gibraltar, the city of Jerusalem, the Turkish-Armenian border, the extraterritorial waters between Havana and Key West in Florida, or the Panama Canal area. «Don’t Cross the Bridge Before You Get to the River» is a perfect example of Alÿs’ assumption that the poetic and the political are intimately linked.
To illustrate his point, Francis Alÿs made a video showing children holding boat shoes on the beach in Tarifa and others on the beach in Tangier. They play in the waves and each line of participants tries to catch up with the other but the tide inexorably brings them back to shore. Francis Alÿs thus tries to answer his question «Will the two lines meet in the chimera of the horizon?»