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Messages from Paradise is an art project in progress based on a fictive dialogue between young people from Egypt, Morocco and Turkey and migrants living in Vienna, Rotterdam and Berlin, telling about their lives, dreams, and expectations of migration. The first two parts between Egypt and Austria, and Morocco and the Netherlands are currently under development. A third dialogue between (possibly) Turkey and Germany is planned for 2009.

Concept/Direction: Daniela Swarowsky (Rotterdam/Vienna)
Advise/Interviews: Samuli Schielke (Rotterdam)
Camera/Sound: Daniela Swarowsky and Samuli Schielke
Editing: Arthur Bueno (Rotterdam)

In a village in Egypt, young men dream of migrating to Europe where they hope to realise all the good things they lack at home: money, freedom, new horizons. In Vienna, Egyptian migrants long back home. Their tales of migration reveal that the realities of living in Europe are more complex and nuanced than they themselves might have dreamt of. Paradise, both sides of this fictional dialogue tell, is always elsewhere. And perhaps happiness lies not in making old dreams come true, but in finding new ones. MORE

The Moroccans of the Netherlands regularly travel to Morocco on summer vacation, meet relatives and make friends there. But both sides appear to find it difficult to communicate or transmit the experiences of living as a migrant (or a migrant's child) on the one hand, and of dreaming of migration, on the other. Messages from Paradise #2 tries to create a different context, a different way to search life on ‘the other side'.MORE