Photos: Ugo Carmeni
The crown jewel of Forever Informed, a concrete cast of a tyre track made by the agency’s cutting-edge surveillance van, “a converted GMC ambulance, pimped out with millions of dollars of surveillance kit, antennas on top reaching out to learn what it can from any smartphone within a 1-kilometer radius and, at the click of a button, empty them of all the content within.”* The piece serves as a pledge, affirming the agency’s long-term commitment to the people of Cyprus and beyond: “We are here. We will build beautiful systems that will work for the benefit of the good guys and the universe. And we need to say it, and I don't think we need to hide it.”**
The concrete cast, against the concrete floor, appears as if it emerges from the ground. A zoomed in snapshot of a geological event, of sorts. Upon closer inspection, many of the archeological qualities and fabulations begin to wither. The inverted tyre track marks reveal that they are, in fact, fabricated, alluding to planted evidence, a perverse forensics operation as it were. Begging the question, what other operations have left their marks on the island throughout the ages, unbeknownst to us.
* Thomas Brewster, “Multimillionaire Spyware Dealer and His $9 Million WhatsApp Hacking Van”, Forbes, 2019.
** Tal Dillian, quoted in: op. cit.
Tyre track, 2024, Lower Levant Company (Emiddio Vasquez & Peter Eramian). Concrete, cement, metal rod, sand, fossils, earth, glitter.
Presented as part of the exhibition On a wildflower-lined gravel track off a quiet thoroughfare… at the Cyprus Pavilion Biennale Arte, Venice, 2024.