Joséphine Berthou – Gendarme et voleur, 2024

Joséphine Berthou has researched and documented a range of professional backgrounds — Internet moderators, truck drivers and rappers, for example — and has written and produced a series of film essays, combining fiction and documentary, which she presents in the form of installations. Drawing on musical comedy, her video work explores the systems that govern capitalist societies, phenomena of influence and control, and relationships that are established or unravel between individuals on social networks.

Joséphine Berthou’s video installation Gendarme et Voleur (“Cops and Robbers”) revisits the children’s game of the same name, and probes the modus operandi of Internet pirates who infiltrate people’s email inboxes. Using computer screens placed on desks, the work digitally pits two protagonists against each other: one posing as a police officer and accusing the other of sexual assault to defraud him of money. Email notifications reveal relationships of power and weakness, where intimidation is met with justification. As doubts creep into the exchanges, and ambiguities multiply in the messages on Facebook or Instagram, Gendarme et Voleur invites visitors to confront their prejudices in the face of complex and delicate realities and to question contemporary fears.