Borders-Ventimiglia Photo
In the Italian/French border town Ventimiglia hundreds of undocumented immigrants try to crosse the boarder with Franse. For me as a European citizen the borders look open as always, but for them its a hard border to crosse. French police is stopping ever “strange” looking person in a radius of 20 kilometers around the border and ask for documents. If they don’t have any they are send back to the Italian border. In december 2016 the Italian border police collected these returns, every day in a bus. When the bus was full they where transported back to the south of Italy. Far away from the French border. Back to the start.. almost a cynical game.
I made this work in assignment for the French ngo Medecines du Monde.
Man from Nigeria just arrived at the train station of Ventimiglia
Man from Bangladesh walks back to from the boarder to ventimiglia, 8 km, after being send back by the french police
Camera from Gambia will tray to cross the boarder to France via the sea site. Now he is going to wash his face in the sea.
Locals from the village Grimaldi markt the trail through the mountains. The white strips will glow in the dark when you lit them with a flashlight, they say.
View on the French italian boarder with in the background the city Menton. On top of the mountain you can see the boarder fence at the so called ‘passo della More’.
Group of afghan boys, killing time on the beach of ventimiglia