Activism and The Image - 3rd February 2021
This mornings session was introduced to us by Anneke the lead tutor of this module and she had the chance to introduce Alex Beldea, a documentarian and commercial photographer from Huddersfield University. Beldea was a guest speaker during our teams session to discuss his work on europe's refugee crisis, but started by showing some images by photographers that he looks at for inspiration such as Tyler Mitchell and Patrick Waterhouse, alongside the Instagram page - @now_you_see_me_moria.
Beldea, A University of Huddersfield. (2021,02,3) Beldea's research images. Brightspace. https://huddersfield.brightspace.com/d2l/le/content/134133/viewContent/938318/View
After this, Alex started to show us a video from the recent unrest in Belarus due to the political issues the country is facing at the moment. The video started with what looks to be police brutality on civilians with someone speaking over the video, then the frame pauses on the eyes of these 'officers' whilst they wear balaclavas to hid their identity. The man speaking over the video then starts to show what he can create using facial recognition technology, he grabs the image of the officer and then generates their true identity and then places their full face onto the video image. This was fascinating to watch and something that I wasn't expecting when the video started, being able to show who these men are that are beating and arresting innocents with their true faces is very powerful technology to have in the countries fight.
Beldea, A University of Huddersfield. (2021,02,3). Brightspace. https://huddersfield.brightspace.com/d2l/le/content/134133/viewContent/938318/View
(Original source & video unknown)
ALEX BELDEA
Beldea, A The Long Wait [introduction]. Alex Beldea. https://www.alexbeldea.co.uk/documentary-1#/the-long-wait/
Alex Beldea then started to discuss his project 'The Long Wait' based on refugees, mainly men travelling from Egypt, Nigeria and Somalia and many other middle eastern countries to escape war, poverty and human cruelty. As Beldea explained, these people had one place to go and this was in the Choucha transit camp in Tunisia, this was a place that these men would spend 9 long years here before being forced to move on. The images from Beldea's website are beautiful and striking, there are portraits of these men along with landscape views and personal property.
Beldea, A The Long Wait [online images]. Alex Beldea. https://www.alexbeldea.co.uk/documentary-1#/the-long-wait/
My thoughts on Alex Beldea's project 'The Long Wait'
Beldea's project to me is very powerful, it creates a thought of refugees in general around the world, but he has focused on the specific refugees that are travelling to Europe from the middle east searching for work and a better life. When listening to the presentation by Alex, I started looking at his website and seeing the images he was showing along with the others that he wasn't. He has given these men a sense of identity by taking their portraits and showing them as human beings in my mind. As Alex was stating in the talk, once these men arrive to the camp in Tunisia they are treated with no respect and seen as the lowest of the low in society. The officials don't give them correct documentation and even refuse to give it to them, along with employers who hire these men but take away their passports and work documents as a way to control them and a way to own the men. In a way this is a form of modern slavery in the 21st Century and shouldn't be allowed anywhere in todays world. I like the images of the men's belongings, the phone and keys for example in the image above, I want to photograph objects that are personal to the businesses involved with my project on the beauty industry and like the way an object can belong to one person and in the situation of these man having belongings is a precious and valuable thing seen as though they have lost so much, family, friends and lives. I find the use of overlapping images interesting and something I want to try for my project also, the way Beldea adds the writing from one image over the top of a portrait is strong and eye catching and even though I can't read the writing I still find myself wanting to know what this text says.
DANIEL CASTRO GARCIA
Following on from Alex Beldea was Daniel Castro Garcia, his project that he wanted to talk to us about was also based on his trips to visit refugee camps in Europe. Castro Garcia has visited many camps during his journeys from May 2015 and April 2016, from London to Lampedusa in Sicily, Italy. Castro Garcia began by sharing some harrowing statistics with the group by explaining over 25,000 refugees have died whist trying to cross the Mediterranean sea in the year 2015 to 2016 alone. I want to also mention that Castro Garcia also asked for students to not take screen grabs of his presentation as he was going to show us some strong and uncomfortable imagery and videos that unfortunately shows drowned refugees and honestly very disturbing imagery (Warnings were given). Castro Garcia states himself as a photographer, videographer and documentarian, he was also given the job title of social worker when he arrived to the camp in Lampedusa and was also seen by many as a humanitarian. He was there to document and help these men very similar to Beldea's camp full of men some as young as thirteen years old from these middle eastern countries like Egypt and Somalia. He also created his book , Foreigner, from the trips he had taken over the months and used the journey and people he met to create this photo book. It was designed by Garcia to represent a passport, in the colour, special thread down the middle and documentation used, I found this to be a great way to create a photo book by using the meaning to create it, with these men not having correct documents and passports or these being taken from them when they entered the country. The book is currently out of stock but something I would love to read personally and see the design myself for inspiration.
GARCIA,C,D FOREIGNER [online images]. DANIEL CASTRO GARCIA. http://www.danielcastrogarcia.com/foreignermigrationintoeurope/
I have taken some images from Daniel's website and referenced these below to show a small glimpse of his project and imagery to put into context.
GARCIA,C,D (2015/16). I Peri N'Tera: Casa Zingale [online images]. DANIEL CASTRO GARCIA. http://www.danielcastrogarcia.com/casa-zingale
My 5 questions...
How did each speaker decide where to go? Which camp and why that specific camp?
Did you make any connections, friends that you are still in contact with?
Are you planning more trips and if so where to and why?
What is you favourite memory from your travels to these camps?
Was it difficult to hear the men's stories of how they came over the boarders and what life they had before they left?
I had a lot of questions to ask when both Alex and Daniel started their talks but these 5 stuck with me and I thought these were the best I had. Due to time and many student questions I wasn't able to ask any of these to either speaker but I'm glad I had them to mind. I am defiantly taking a lot away from this sessions speakers and information, firstly the imagery created by both are stunning, the bright use of colour and the ascetic shots look amazing and secondly, the way Daniel Castro Garcia created the Foreigner book is inspiring to me, using another object to inspire his final publication is something I will be looking into for my final project as stated before. I fully enjoyed the session even though the topic of the talks was sometimes hard to listen to with the sadness of the refugees losing their lives and most of humanity not wanting to care that men, women and children are dying whilst making this dangerous crossing for a better life. Both talks were powerful and inspiring and I highly recommend anyone to have a look at Alex Beldea and Daniel Castro Garcia's websites for the imagery and information on these projects.
Reflection with Liam Devlin
After these talks with Alex and Daniel, we gathered in creative groups to reflect and analyse the work shown to us this morning. We started by sharing our thoughts on the talks, sharing how we felt after seeing some hard to watch videos, that was something that really hit home to me in a way that I never thought would. I have seen images on the news of refugees and the unfortunate end for some before but the video Daniel shared was different, it showed the situation in its worst, something you wouldn't see on tea time news. I felt uncomfortable watching this piece of film but also felt that it was important to see the real truth and the real situation that many are dealing with on a daily basis. A lot of the other students in the call also felt the same way, the way in which it was hard to view but felt they should to understand the situation. Secondly, we started to view the @now_you_see_me_moria Instagram page and the first thing I noticed was the difference in the amount of followers the page had from the screenshot on Alex Beldea's presentation to the account now. they have gone from 2,800 followers to over 22k (unsure of the time difference) but this proves social media has a power and be it either good or bad it works to get things out in the world better than some news channels or journalists.
Instagram. [now_you_see_me_moria]. [Instagram page]. Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/now_you_see_me_moria/
We started to look at the different posters people from all over the world had made and submitted to the page's website for free. Anyone can send a version of a poster to the page and it will be uploaded onto the website. This is a task that I want to do and send to the page to see what graphic design ideas I can come up with and a way to generate a network with others.
[Poster submissions]. now you see me moria. https://nowyouseememoria.eu/
We then started to share the difference between journalism and activism, looking at how journalists look for the image or idea to sell to the highest bid, they are natural in the side they chose and usually opt for the mainstream media connection and hide behind the camera. Whereas activists are there for the real thing, ambition real change and help to others in need, be it on the ground or online with real stories to tell that are honest and reliable. There will always be a split in the mainstream media and real activism and story telling while money and power are involved and nothing will change without change itself.
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