Trabajos forzados
(Hard labour)
Video projection
Spain 2005, miniDV, PAL, 5:4, Colour, Sereo, 3'20''
Video performance in which a group of construction workers practise the traditional movements of a Japanese gymnasium (Radio Gym*1), step by step, to piano music. This recoding was made outside their working hours, and their participation in the video was ordered by the site foreman.
*1 * Radio Gymnastics was founded in Japan in 1928 by the Social Security Section of the Ministry of Communication of the time (now the Mail and Telegraph Ministry) in order to favour public health in Japan. Current Radio Gymnastics that all Japanese know about and many still practise, is based on the revised version that was developed in 1951. Japanese children still learn the routine and take advantage of their 40 days' summer holidays to learn it, going to their local park at 6.30 in the morning.