#paradise
Samuel Bollendorff
The series Contaminations, which was exhibited here at Visa pour l’Image in 2018, looked at the irreparable industrial pollution that has made certain areas unfit for living beings for centuries. I came back from my travels round the world for that project a very different person, conscious of the urgency of the environmental crisis, and ready to take action.
I started to look for ways to represent climate change. We all know that images of polar bears floating on melting icebergs aren’t effective in raising awareness. They are no doubt too far removed from us. They don’t affect our personal concerns and they don’t make us change our lifestyles. And yet, within the constant stream of images we are subjected to, we see more and more disasters taking place.
When I reported on the wildfire disaster in the town of Paradise in California, I saw that, despite the constant news about what is happening to the planet, people still tend to react with disbelief and denial. What photographic language would allow the global aspect of these personal reactions to be communicated?
Preview
The question of whether or not to travel came to the fore with the Covid pandemic. The idea of travelling around the world to take pictures of climatic events that are already being shown on social networks by the people who are experiencing them raised an important question of coherence. Given the constant stream of images, is it ethically justifiable for me to take dozens of flights so that I can take photographs of a planet that is being documented as closely and continuously as possible?
I decided to search on social networks for images posted by people affected by disasters, whether in the United States, China, Brazil, Greece, Mexico, France, etc.
#paradise is made up of screen shots taken from social networks such as Facebook, Instagram, X, TikTok and Truth Social. The words and pictures that people shared reveal how they personally experienced the disasters. Images of tragedy, shock, denial, individualistic blindness, inappropriate selfies, conspiracy theories and religious fervor. In a word, Humanity.
Like Albert Kahn’s “Archives de la Planète” or the “real photo postcards” that Americans sent each other at the beginning of the 20th century, #paradise is an archive of people’s reactions to the climate crisis.
Curator: Samuel Bollendorff
