The former airport of Zweibrücken, located in Germany near the French border hosts 520 refugees, 294 men, 155 women and 71 minors. In theory this camp, managed by the Red Cross and Red Crescent, acts as a stop where families get reunited while they ask for asylum in Germany. The families live within the confines of the airport, sleeping on 800 bunk beds, separated by fabric curtains.
The Jungleye Zweibrücken Workshop focused on the airport, using it as both a theme and metaphor in the work. Despite the fact that the refugees were living in an airport, like a grounded plane, they were not able to cross the border. The workshops, aiming to understand the symbolism and surrounding context of these facts, encouraged the participants to focus their cameras on their surroundings. Family portraits were also a way to portray the meeting points for these families who were divided by the war and exile.
The informal refugee camp in Grande Synthe, Dunkerque, was strategically located between the highway and the railway. Over 1,500 people lived there with the hope of crossing the Channel to reach Europe. Most of them were Kurdish from Iraq and Syria. The living condition in this camp was slightly improved compared to the Jungle, half an hour drive away, in Calais. Gravel prevented the rain from turning the ground to mud and wood shelters rather than tarps covered the inhabitants in Grande Synthe, but still, hundreds of families spent their time physically and mentally exhausted.
Despite everything, they kept overcoming their weariness and continued to demons- trate qualities of resilience, fueled in part by their hope of a new life in England : “ Everyday, all of us are trying our best to get into these trucks crossing the border to Britain. “
For three days, Jungleye gave the cameras to these families and their kids, and let them shoot their world. A big frame was built in the camp, inviting everyone to share their dreams and capture it in a photograph.
The refugee camp known as the Jungle was settled in an industrial zone on the seaside, strategically located between the port and the Channel Tunnel. Over 14 hectares, these sand dunes were once an industrial dumping site of Calais as well as a former summer camp complex. Jungleye’s initial concept was to delve into of the history and metaphors of the place itself. Exploring the dichotomy of the place—an area that was once both a holiday camp and a dump became a focal point for the workshop.
Many associations, NGOs and volunteers helped the refugees living at the Jungle, but most groups provided activities and aid that targeted children and/or women despite the fact that the majority of the camp was male youth and adults. Recognizing that the men were also vulnerable, Jungleye decided to work specifically with men.
One of the first goals in Calais was to give an identity, a name, and an image to refugees who were more often perceived as a single human mass and not as individuals. The Jungle refugee camp quickly became a real “city” with its own businesses, social places, neighborhoods. In a very dynamic atmosphere, the camp was characterized by continuous movement, basic social interactions and this feeling of creation in all parts of the camp. It was through this sensibility that the creative laboratory known as Jungleye was born.
As the classes began to focus on photojournalism, many photographers documented the permanent violence with the police, the living conditions in the camp, the daily life between families and social groups, the dismantling of the camp, and the opening of the new camp founded by the government. Since the tensions with camp authorities was a constant and looming presence, the participants often worked under the same kind of duress as photojournalists do. With time and working through the process of creation; however, the participants began to discover a way to narrate their own story through images. It was through this assertion of each individual story, that the participants were able to rediscover themselves.
