From Greece to Germany: a photo documentary by Marie Dorigny on European hospitality

Résumé En

How does photography represent migration? When it comes to represent migration, children are everywhere: crying at the Mexican border (John Moore, World Press photo 2019), on their way to Germany with their families (Marie Dorigny, Displaced 2015) or gathered in refugee-camps (Leila Allaoui - Nasreen 2013), non to mention the famous photograph of Aylan Kurdi stranded on the beach of Bodrum in Turkey.Focusing on Marie Dorigny’s work depicting the various stages of the migrants’ harrowing journey, this presentation will question children’s presence in the pictures as a strategy to denounce the contemporary erosion of hospitality as a fundamental and sacred duty.The idea is to analyse photography in its ability to fabricate and present migration and hospitality stories. But, more generally, the focus on the emblematic value of the child and on its pleading role in migrations narratives, will initiate an exploration of the evolving relation to the face of the other. It will present the position of photography as as a close and far intermediary, saving the host countries from coming too close to potential enemies. It will therefore reveal the current transformation and ambiguity of contemporary hospitality, left to abstract entities: local authorities and humanitarian organisations. Finally, all this may also expose the migrant-ghosts that make the European past.