covid state watch - Eda Seyhan, Australia, Rym Khadhraoui, UK, and Sacha Biton, France
COVID State Watch documents, analyses and visualises police abuses and the misuse of emergency powers during the coronavirus pandemic. The project provides a global platform to document the repressive impact of emergency frameworks and analyse global trends, notably the impact of pandemic powers on already over-policed groups and the misuse of such powers to crack down on protests and activism. Information gathered from local activists and organisations, and through monitoring news and social media, is shared on the @CovidStateWatch Twitter account. In view of the historic nature of this moment and to archive the impact of unchecked powers and emergency frameworks in a more conceptual and experimental form, a short film is being made using footage from a street under lockdown in the 18th arrondissement in Paris, a working-class and multi-racial area that is heavily policed, and information collected through the project. COVID State Watch are lawyer/activists Eda Seyhan and Rym Khadhraoui and artist/activist Sacha Biton.
