Easterly Winds Vientos de Levante

The past is present, 2019

Artist: Alan Perez in collaboration with Shane Dalmedo and Kyle Pecino

As a consequence of the 1967 referendum the Gibraltar border eventually was closed by the dictator General Franco and Gibraltarians had to adapt their everyday life to a new and restricted way of life living. For this project 12 Gibraltarians, 6 male and 6 female who lived through the 1967 Gibraltar Referendum and the closure of the border were interviewed.

Some who left Gibraltar when the border was closed, some who stayed in Gibraltar and some Spanish citizens who married Gibraltarians and stayed in the Rock. All the interviewed people were asked the same question, ‘what do you remember of the 1967 Referendum and the closure of the border?’ All of the individual accounts give a more balanced and human aspect of what happened during the 1967 referendum and the closure of the Gibraltar border.

All the voice from the interviews where digitally overlapped to create an uncomfortable sound which is a reflection on the inhumane aspect of the whole past situation, which unfortunately is now more present due to Brexit, even though 96% of Gibraltarians voted to stay in the EU. The overlapped sound was digitally transformed into a moving digital image which is projected and echoes the stories of all the interview people.

Brexit- Cube of fears, dreams and hopes, 2017

This Installation was exhibited in both sides of the border, in Gibraltar at the Gustavo Bacarisas Gallery and in La Linea at the Cruz Herrera Museum. During the time exhibited the installation collected information based on what the citizens of both cities though on their fears, dreams and hopes related to the question of Brexit. They deposited written notes onto the glass bottles and vases hanging form the wooden cuboid structure. The collected information was later turned into a split screen film which is now projected beside the installation.

The wooden cuboid structure is hollow and people were able to go inside the structure to deposit written pieces of paper into the hanging glass bottles and vases. The idea was to have a structure that was organic and grows from within when people interacted, collaborated and deposited their written messages in the structure, more bottles were added during the length of the exhibition.

With the current political uncertainty that Gibraltar and the Campo de Gibraltar is going through due to Brexit, the installation can be some kind of therapeutic community art installation where people can anonymously deposit their fears, dreams and hopes inside the bottles. It is like when people put messages in bottles and throw them in the sea and they hope someone somewhere else in another part of the world can help them to overcome their problems.

The lights in-between the hanging bottles with the messages and the whole installation can reflect shadow into the room creating an environment with an ambience that encloses the cuboid structure. Sound comes from the moving bottles from a fan which provides wind for the glass to move, as if the structure is alive and growing.

Universal Immigrant, 2017

The project is a film based on the life of a Gibraltarian student who left Gibraltar to study in the UK and then pursued a career as an international acclaimed DJ, lived in London and travelled the world. In London he was an immigrant and when he travelled abroad to work as a DJ he was also considered a foreign worker. When he returned to Gibraltar he would live at his parents ' house and had no rights to any government benefits, as he was not working in Gibraltar.

He became a universal immigrant who would travel from country to country but did not legally belong anywhere. His identity was lost and he was the prototype of a modern day traveler who can only be defined as a citizen of the world. Due to modern technology, easy travel abroad and the hunger for success, the life of this character does no longer conform with the norms of society, but to a vision of a modern universal Immigrant.

As a young Gibraltarian art student studying in Scotland I sometimes questioned who Gibraltarians are, or how other countries see us. Are we are not a country, but a colony? Which in the modern world can sometimes be seen as an anomaly and probe the frequent question of misunderstanding about who we are or where we come from. Are we Gibraltarians? Or are we British? Do the British see us as British? And what does it mean to be Gibraltarian.

In my film I will show the places this Gibraltarian DJ traveled to for work and how today’s immigrants can have work, money and even fame, but do not belong anywhere; this is a new kind of immigrant who is part of an international phenomenon of universal immigrants.

Gibraltar’s civil population was evacuated during the WW2 and the suitcase used for this Installation which is from the WW2 evacuation reminds us that History can repeat itself and makes us think about the past and the present.