Bassam Issa Al-Sabah at FACT

Bassam Issa Al-Sabah presents THE MISSION IS THE END, THE END IS ALL I WANT! at FACT Liverpool. Al-Sabah blurs digital fantasy with unsettling echoes of the real world, forcing you to question reality and the platforms we now live through. 

The exhibition uses CGI film, sculpture and digital aesthetics to explore how online spaces are shaping our identity, our desires and the personalities we choose to present. Al-Sabah is known for building environments where resistance and transformation are forced together, these works in fact show a collide, symbolising ourselves being almost irreversibly merged with digital culture. 

Almost as if they have dropped out of the digital world, into the gallery

The exhibition is centred around a CGI film that follows a group of fantastical characters attempting to navigate a world unrecognizable to our own but may reign true metaphorically. A world shaped by algorithms and expectations. The film shows the characters wrestle with the urge to follow, resist or make their own way through the strange landscape despite it seeming tightly controlled.

Surrounding the film is a series of large-scale sculptures. These pieces appear to be parts of the world we know but collided and reconfigured with others. They are fragmented and cracked, almost as if they have dropped out of the digital world, into the gallery, bringing with them the sense of collapse seen on screen. 

What happens when digital representations begin to replace lived experience? For many of us, the lines have already blurred. Online spaces often promise freedom and expression, yet have resulted in narrowing the way people see themselves. Curated profiles, exaggerated stories, filters, face-tune, fake news: it is seductive, but unstable. This exhibition asks visitors to look past what the digital world was supposed to be, and consider whether digital identity expresses desire, or quietly reshapes it.