Stage of Lifeoriginated with a blanket belonging to Stéphanie Saadé’s brother Patrick. It lay next to hers in their shared bedroom in Beirut. When they fled the war, they took the bedding with them to Europe. Saadé created the work after the great explosion of 2020 affected her memory. She cut the blanket into strips, inspired by the Lebanese princess Elissa (Dido), founder of the North African city of Carthage. Elissa bought from a local tribe 'as much land as an ox hide covers'. Cunningly, she cut the hide into narrow strips and enclosed a hill with it; the city's fortress was later built there. Similarly, Saadé's strips bridge the distance between the most intimate place in the home, the bed, and the front door, where outside begins. For The Encounter of the First and Last Particles of Dust, the artist embroidered onto her own baby blanket the twelve routes it travelled with her between 1983 and 1995. [text 2024]