Artist’s Statement:
We are born in this world to discover that racism has many facets – the religion of one, the colour of the other, the social class, the shape and size of each one of us.
At 17 years old, the religious war in Lebanon that ravaged a beloved and magical place, sent me on a journey to Africa. There, pride, wisdom, love, art and knowledge developed in me and I could not accept what one colour did to the other colour.
Then I went to the western world, to the land of self-expression. Soon it was clear that social class, colour and, lately, religion are as real a problem here as anywhere else.
We are all in a bubble and we move towards one known end in which tolerance could be the path.
It is a mosiac, like we are a mosaic of people – large and small, multi-coloured, so La Bulle is the world in itself. La Bulle, installed in 2006 in Beirut in front of the Phoenicia Hotel, is a few meters away from an explosion that killed innocent people in February, 2005. The direction in which the people are walking in La Bulle is away from the site of violence. They are holding hands; they are people who are handicapped, pregnant, of different colours… tolerance towards each other is the first step to understanding and respecting others.
All images © Nelsy Massoud
Nelsy may be contacted at: nelsmassoud@yahoo.com
