Exhibition opening
Blackbox Abschiebung (Black Box Deportation) - Exhibition Opening
Images and tales of people who would have liked to stay
Opening podium discussion with Mark Terkessidis, Ralf Jesse, Bruno Watara und N.N./Initiative gegen Abschiebehaft
The revolutions across the Arab World have put another issue in the spotlight refugees trying to make it into Europe. Yet theres an aspect to this story that rarely makes the headlines: every year, about ten thousand people are deported from Germany. These peoples stories rarely reach the public at large, despite the fact that most of them were torn from functioning lives and livelihoods. We rarely find out what happens to them after they are forced to leave Germany, which many of them have long since come to regard as their new home.
They disappear out of sight and out of mind.
The exhibition project "Blackbox Abschiebung" is an attempt to document the life stories of some of these "deportees". People awaiting deportation are asked to tell the story of their life. They take a camera with them and report back on their lives after deportation, sending the chip cards from their cameras back to Germany.
The opening evening features a discussion between Mark Terkessidis, Ralf Jesse, Bruno Watara and A.N.OTHER/Initiative gegen Abschiebehaft
Short biographies:
Ralf Jesse was born in 1965 and studied Philosophy, Theater, Film, Television and English in Cologne. He works as a freelance director, producer, writer, and cinematographer for various publications, institutions and broadcasters. In 2008 he produced and directed the documentary “We Came, We Stayed, We Got Deported” (together with N. Breuers).
Bruno Watara, activist of the movement Europe-Afrique interact and the Alliance against camps in Berlin / Brandenburg, was born in 1963 in Togo where he grew up. As a student he began to get involved in the opposition movement against the regime of dictator Gnassingbe Eyadema. When he witnessed a political assassination in 1993, he was forced to flee to Ghana. Out of safety reasons he fled to Germany in 1997 where he applied for asylum and was sent to a refugee camp in Tramm-Zapel/Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Together with other refugees, Bruno began to question the miserable living conditions and prepared nationwide actions and demonstrations in cooperation with the network “nolager”.
A project by ISVC e.V. and RUHR.2010, supported by Fonds Soziokultur, in cooperation with the Haus der Kulturen der Welt (opening podium)