Projects
Dubai Citytellers
Two million workers from India, Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh work 12 hours a day at 140°F to build the most impressive cathedral on earth in the desert. They have been reduced to modern day indentured labour by the same system which promotes Dubai as an 'Opulence ad-personam experience'.
Francesco Jodice
Dubai Citytellers, 2010
Video, 12'54"
Courtesy of the Artist
Written by: Francesco Jodice & Saverio Pesapane
Line Producer: Daniele Gentili
Cinematographer: Enrico Cremagnani
Original Sound Score: Alessandro Sambini
Editor: Angelo Boriolo (Boris)
Produced by Francesco Jodice Supported by Unicredit & Art
A city that has grown up in the desert and has become both a beacon for some and a cautionary tale about hubris for others. Home to architectural superlatives, Dubai certainly attracts both 'big' business and people in equal measure but its success is reliant on more than just luxury and tall buildings - someone has to service that luxury and someone has to build those buildings.
Co-written with Saverio Pesapane, Francesco Jodice's film Dubai Citytellers explores what it takes - in material and human terms - to support Dubai and its inhabitants. Examining, in an even-handed and investigative manner, the lives of the people who live there and the workers and ex-pats who populate this city, Jodice leaves it to the viewer to come to their own opinion about the city that is Dubai.
Jodice and Pesapane present here the second chapter of Dubai Citytellers: 'Desert Mirage'.