Francis Alÿs : juegos de niñxs, 1999-2022

Since 1999, Alÿs has been producing videos that document the games that children play on the street and in courtyards around the world. Children’s Games is an ongoing archive of urban practices that modernization has banished from everyday life, as the concept of public space is distorted by the domination of motor vehicles and electronic diversions. The children’s games that Alÿs captures constitute a threatened underground culture that brings together generations and crosses borders. Their rules, images and references project a variety of concepts on time and the world and suggest an ancient, potent substrate underlying our shared experience; another reason why we should be concerned with their imminent disappearance.

Alÿs’ body of works encompasses many forms of media such as video, installations, paintings and drawings. Over the past decade children have become the main focus of his projects. Many of the videos have been shot in relatively economically underdeveloped regions of the world, where the strength of tradition and community have allowed a childhood on the streets to survive.