A community is a cluster of individuals attached or linked by a unity of purpose. This unity we call a centre. Generally, at the starting point of each centre is a need to develop a new survival strategy, the need for innovation in an old, dated and fundamentalist environment. Previous centres are no longer relevant to the community needs; individuals for the most part fell disappointed and disadvantaged, disillusioned and misunderstood.

Thus a created void faces the urgency to establish a new centre point so to fulfill the newly created requirements. This is the birth of a new centre. At the same time, not every centre or a new survival recipe is capable of linking the members strongly enough, so it can establish itself as such. The closer the members are connected to the centre, the stronger the centre becomes. Since the power of the centre and collective fixation of its surrounding members are so dominant, autonomy of a single member is only possible when he/she moves away from the centre.Small communities, e.g. family units, are catapulted from the “ developing countries” and into the Economic Metropolis. We call a country of origin an “A-Centre” and the destination a “B-Centre”. As a result of post globalization and Market Imperialism, in all of the A-Centres, cultural rules and related social aspects are forced to change as a reaction, a response to the political, social, economical, and human issues in both private and public spheres.
 

At times, after reaching their new destination, some, even very small units develop into some kind of isolated cells. For the sake of the point we are making, it is probably better to say that they are in fact not developing but degenerating! They are neither any longer aware of the changes in their respective A-Centres - their former homelands, nor can they connect to a new situation in the B-Centres. They become what’s called the “ dead satellites”: They insist on maintaining their inherent values safe and sound and to pro-tect them from every intrusion by the West. Even if and when they adopt certain aspects from the B-Centre, deep inside they remain intransigent. They are stuck in a hybrid, in-between, or neither-nor status – related, though remotely to the idea about a centre which no longer exists, which may have never existed. There is no more life, movement, self-development for or inside of them – they become Dead Satellites.

- Shahram Entekhabi 2007

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Dead Satellites:

Performers: Sarah Bennani & Shahram Entekhabi
Camera & Editing: Kristina Paustian
Assistant Director & Photo Story: Martina Schöne-Radunski
Costumes: Herr von Eden

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Special Thanks to: entertainment 3000, Berlin, Herr von Eden (Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne), Franco Marinotti, Ali Zaidi. Melanie Jeske

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Written & Directed by Shahram Entekhabi

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Photo Story:

Performers: Sarah Bennani & Shahram Entekhabi
Photographs by Martina Schöne-Radunski

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