Monitor Man in the Time of Pandemic

Short description of Monitor Man in The Time of Pandemic - short film 2021

Monitor Man in the Time of Pandemic explores the global political crisis from the time of COVID-19 to the social instabilities and movements in the Western world. At the core of the project lies an interest in transgressing national and physical borders by using Yassine Khaled's Monitor Man -concept as it enables new kinds of interactions across virtual meeting points and reflects the current situation of our global society. The time of lockdown has been exceptional and challenging for many people around the world, so communication technology became one of the only tools to be connected with families and friends. That inspired Khaled to make this new short film about his long term -project "Monitor Man". In this film Monitor Man has conversations with six people from three continents.

Link for the trailer: https://vimeo.com/434015022

Interview about the short film of Monitor Man in the Time of Pandemic:

Monitor Man is project which I started in 2016. My aim was to reflect the current digital cultural communication which is becoming something inescapable. Probably digital way of communication is the only form of communication in the future. First, I was only performing this work in crowded public places like shopping centres and inside public transport to have possible interactions with Finnish audience.

The current corona situation made the world to be more isolated and separated from many physical interactions as many people were/are separated from their friends, families and even from some public spaces, like cafes and restaurants. So, most of the people living in social distancing in the time of pandemic gather to the parks and forests to feel a bit of freedom, enjoy the nature and to feel safe together with other people.

During these specific times, I had a question what are global cultural reactions to this time in a larger image when all the cultural spaces has been closed. As an artist, I was thinking in the beginning very carefully, what is the direction of art in the time of pandemic? And what is the need of cultural spaces if corona time will last for long? Especially when you see reactions like some of the biggest museums were organizing virtual tours to show their exhibitions.

As Monitor Man -project was already talking about the physical limitations which the majority of people in the world have as they cannot travel easily out of their countries. For these people virtual communication is the only way to talk with somebody outside their countries. That was a thing that instantly associated on my mind when the limitations of traveling first appeared in the time of pandemic, and that made me to take this opportunity to react very quickly to it.

Starting of closing the borders and having lockdowns around the world was like a quick bang for all the cultures to change their cultural practices. Then I started to imagine a new version of Monitor Man performing in the forest without Finnish public but in Finnish forest and other desolate places.

My aim is to react to this historical moment when corona changed many things in human life. Today, in many parts of the world, there is nothing missing so bad than physical communication, and now in corona time it turned out that many times the only way of communication and interaction is virtual or digital.

I wanted to give people the opportunity to see the art even in places which you don’t see art.

Visual Artist Yassine Khaled walked in a Finnish forest wearing a helmet with an iPad attached to it and had conversations with six people from around the world. The result is a Together Alone -work Monitor Man in The Time of Pandemic.

This is an update of your earlier work Monitor Man. How did you come up with the idea for Monitor Man in the first place?

When I arrived to Helsinki in 2015, I had a cultural shock. It’s hard to describe it. In the same time there was the refugees crisis. So, the level of communication was so weak; cold and people were not friendly. When I started learning about the level of communication of Finnish people in the public spaces, I started noticing that people do not communicate much with each others and with strangers in other way, like they are not interested about others. So, I tried to figure out how I could approach this as an artist. It was also difficult to find an exhibition space, so the only way was to do something in the public spaces, as it was easier for me to engage with people and show my things in art to also integrate to the art field.

My first idea was to have a box on my head and write a question on it and just walk in public space and try to see Finnish people’s reactions. Very fast I understood it will not work, so I got to know that the only way to create physical/actual communication was through a technological devise. I was trying to capture some level of communication through technology which is the great image of communication today. Monitor Man can be seen as a communication platform to invite somebody outside of Europe to discover the Western world and vice versa. I wanted to combine communication in a public space and to give this opportunity to people who cannot travel to communicate with westerners and in the same to westerners the opportunity to meet someone they wouldn’t meet otherwise.

How does the Monitor Man in The Time of Pandemic differ from the previous work?

I started to perform Monitor Man in 2016 and I have been in ten different countries in Europe. I’ve made two versions videos of this project. The focus was before on global digitalization - how technology changed the way of communication and how much we started to use it. Of course, we don’t forget the limitations of the poor countries as it’s almost impossible for many to travel to a Western country. So, the only way is the virtual way. This new version of Monitor Man reflects also the social media -culture. Nowadays, people are sharing more of about their private lives and started to live with others virtually.

In this new version of Monitor Man, I have invited six people around the world, from Belgium, France, Poland, Morocco and The United States to take a walk in a Finnish forest in the middle of nowhere and discuss about their lives and how they have experienced the time of pandemic.

Were there any similarities or differences in the conversations with the collaborators from different countries?

One of the main thing is to explore if we have the same thing all together or somebody is experiencing the pandemic differently from others.

In Morocco, people cannot go outside from their homes after 6 pm and without masks you can’t go out at all. In Finland, most of people who wear masks seem to be foreign or old, and you are free to go out anytime. It’s really different than in New York where I spent two months, from February to March. There people were in panic and the atmosphere was so scary in public spaces, almost like in some Hollywood movies which describe future catastrophs.

In your works you explore power and wealth relations. How do you think the Covid-19 pandemic will affect them?

Millions of people have already lost their jobs. Still, the situation is not clear for many families. Many jobs will disappear. I could say we were living more physically free before and that won’t happen in the same way in near future.

The pandemic time has changed our communication, cultural practices and lifestyles. Maybe we will choose to be closer to nature and near surroundings. Many people in the big cities are trying to go from closed spaces to open spaces. Maybe in the future more people will prefer to live in the suburbs rather than in the cities.

In the piece you walk in Finnish forest while speaking to collaborators around the world. What’s the significance of Finnish forest for you?

Most of the collaborators are isolated inside their homes and cannot go to the forest or it’s far away. I wanted to give people the opportunity to see Finnish forest and nature.

Do you have any new plans for Monitor Man after this?

I will continue with Monitor Man as a new project that I’m currently developing. Monitor Man has been a long term project for about five years now. It’s also reflecting my teenage boy dream that one day I'll be traveling through video games as I have always been very curious about other cultures. When the Internet came and I found a public camera in Time Square in New York in real time, it was a like a dream come true for me. Maybe the idea comes from that.