Looking back at the sea


  • Photographer
    Katie Barlow
  • Prize
    Honorable Mention
  • Date of Photograph
    January 2016
  • Technical Info
    Canon 5D Mark III

I travelled to Image 1: This image captures a dramatic moment in time, refugee children looking back at the sea that they have successfully crossed. To me they looked haunted, shell shocked, in their temporary place of safety, the UN transfer Bus. The dusty window gives the photograph a painterly feel, otherworldly. The sweeping curtain conjures thoughts of theatre but there is no acting here. Image: 2: You don't need to see her face to know this is a little girl, her small frame, her pink bobble hat, Slumped forward on the seat in front of her, she is tired form the journey she has just endured across the cold and perilous sea. The sunlight catches the heat foil blanket that she is wrapped in, highlighting the emergency. To me, this image epitomises the innocence here and in turn highlights the absurdity of this crisis.

Story

I travelled to Lesvos at the beginning of this year to bear witness to and document the refugee crisis. The image of Aylan Kurdi had evoked upset and anger in me, as it had for millions. It had also been broadcast to the world on a day that I had been swimming in the English Channel, with a GoPro on my head, filming a woman doing the cross-channel swim. She was swimming to raise awareness of infertility, a story personal to her and which forms part of a documentary I am making about not being able to have children.

I had spent most of the summer training in Dover to be her support swimmer, looking over to Calais as news of the mass influx of refugees in the Jungle camp emerged. Most were hoping to make it across to England in the back of trucks, but some had tried to swim, and drowned. I started to question the validity of my professional and personal focus, unsure that my feelings about my own situation were justified in comparison to the global loss of life. It was jarring to have been immersed in the water, filming a “rites of passage” film about loss and longing for a child, in the channel that so many refugees were desperately trying to cross, risking their lives to do so.

A few hours after I had filmed Jessica’s elation as she reached the shore of Calais – a kind of rebirth and a new lease of life beyond childlessness – our screens were flooded with images of a dead child, washed up on a beach in Turkey after a failed attempt to cross the sea in a search for sanctuary. My response was to change focus and go to Calais, delivering aid, and then on to Lesvos where many of the boats from Turkey arrive. I knew I was strong enough to be helpful as a water rescuer if need be, and I was asked to take photos for the Refugee Council. I spent two weeks at Katia beach, helping with and documenting the arrival of thousands of refugees as their boats drifted to the Greek shore. Many photographers were waiting at the shoreline trying to capture the essence of what we were witnessing: a mass migration of historical proportions. Finding it hard to film and photograph people in distress and feeling the need to help the refugees off the boats and to change sodden clothes instead of document, I found myself waiting until people were safe and dry before taking portraits.

Away from the chaos of the beach, I became drawn to the UN transfer buses that were waiting to take the refugees to the registration camps. Although uncertain of what the immediate future held, their first perilous journey over the sea had been successfully accomplished and the UN bus became a temporary place a sanctuary, where families and individuals could get warm, shelter from the rain and freak snow storms. As the refugees took to their seats, some would look out of their windows, back at the ocean that had brought them to this point. Others would slump exhausted, others huddled in the warmth, some smiled with relief.

From where I was standing, each bus window served as a frame and presented a portrait. There was a calm, although it was harrowing. Away from the chaos of the beach, people were still and reflective.

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