Lida Abdul, *Kabul, 1973
lives and works in
Los Angeles and Kabul

In Transit, 2008 
4’55’’ video
16 mm film, digitalized
Courtesy Galleria Giorgio Persano

Selected Exhibitions:
51esima Biennale di Venezia, Italy, 2005; São Paulo Biennial, Brasil, 2006; Gwangju Biennial, South Korea, 2006; MOMA New York, U.S. 2007; Moscow Biennial, Russia, 2007; documenta (13), Kassel, Germany, 2012; Finalist Mario Merz Prize 1, Turin, Italy, 2015; 56. Biennale di Venezia, Italy, 2015.

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Afghan film-maker Lida Abdul (Kabul, 1973) presents the video film In Transit (2008), shot in her home country, in which she shows a group of children attempting to make a shot-down Russian plane fly again. With enormous dedication, they stuff the holes in the plane with tufts of cotton wool and try to get it back off the ground by fixing sails to it, as if it were a kite. The children's game, highly transformational and unswayed by preconceptions, is seen in stark contrast to the destructive power of war and conveys the indestructible, constantly reborn power of hope for a better future in poetic images.