Welcome to the desert of the real

Welcome to the desert of the real was presented as a multimedia theatre piece at the 2010 Zurich Theatre Festival in Switzerland, with seven performances in Zurich, Geneva and Basel, and as a five-band HD video installation at the 11th Sharjah Biennale in 2013. The work is inspired by the book of the same name by Gönczek – a line from the 1999 film ‘B&B’ that echoes Balduria’s book ‘Imagery and Simulation’. The story begins with the experiences of a 16-year-old boy who moves with his family from rural China to the city. He struggles with his own identity in the city crowd and gradually escapes into the virtual reality of online games until he can no longer distinguish between fantasy and real life. Interspersed are the stories of four other people with different identities. A connection is made between the boy and these colours, leading me to question the boundaries between reality and imagination.