This exhibition, featuring five artists – photographers, a videographer, a draughtsman, and a painter – showcases their work as a sort of S.O.S, a call for help. The migrants have made us rediscover the reality of a border.
Between France and Italy, we had forgotten this line dividing two states. One could travel from Menton to Ventimiglia without any control, leaving the Côte d’Azur to discover the Riviera dei Fiori. The migrants, those men, women, and children fleeing from war, faced countless dangers only to end up at our doorstep. At the Saint Louis Bridge in early summer 2015, they would camp on the rocks for four months.
Adrien Rebaudo retraces their journey, not just stopping at the Italian border. There’s also Calais and its tunnel, yet another border, where the photographer shares the tragedy of these human beings herded like cattle. Hannaka, well known to regulars of the Depardieu gallery, focused on a man on his path of exile – 48 photos, 48 chapters of a life.
Black and white images to not forget this man and his story. Nadine Spinoza with her sketches, loose sheets perhaps whisked away by the wind! Silhouettes and faceless figures, like a crowd in the street, anonymous; in fact, it could be you, us, me, or that neighbor you pass every morning without noticing.
Nadine’s drawings speak to us, with a simple message: “Look at yourself! It’s you walking by.” They are a perfect illustration of Adrien Rebaudo’s photos. The crowd in the dark night and them, human shadows in search of hope.
The videographer Elisabeth Cosimi immerses us directly among these migrants, in their tent village where a makeshift church stands. Their direct and immediate testimony, an unvarnished film, not Hollywood but human. Cinema has given life to photography by animating it, and Elisabeth demonstrates this with the daily life of these migrants; They are not playing a role, it is their life.
Poignant, heartbreaking, and gripping. “Let us make room for the foreigner,” says the hymn. Let us make room for the other, let us not close our borders, open doors and windows, said John Paul II.
The last artist has the honor of concluding. David, a member of Amnesty International, exhibits his paintings. “Alas, throughout history, people have preferred walls to doors. Previously, borders were meant to prevent exit; now, it’s more about entry.”
The artist concludes his presentation: “The most beautiful journey leads one towards another.” But, are we still capable of reaching out to others? That is the final, most important question posed by this exhibition.
Thierry Jan
