On the Periphery explores the neighbourhood of Neve Sha’anan, situated on the historical border between Tel Aviv and Jaffa, Israel. The neighbourhood is located between two Central bus stations: the now abandoned old terminal, built in 1941, and the new station, completed in 1993. The project investigates the effect these two dominant buildings have on their immediate environment, in terms of the urban fabric that remains on the peripheries, and the community that inhabits the area.
As with the forgotten buildings on the edges of the bus stations, the neighbourhood of Neve Sha'anan accommodates displaced communities. Since 2005, approximately 15000 Eritrean and Sudanese refugees have made the neighbourhood their temporary home. In addition, migrant workers from South East Asia, elderly Jewish residents, sex workers and drug addicts, co- exist in this small area, each offering their own urban signposts.
The photographs in this portfolio are a journey through this urban space, and each building represents a story which weaves together the history of Neve Sha’anan. History is frozen by architecture, and buildings become concrete memory. My photographic approach is aimed at mirroring the theoretical exploration, and each photograph includes a demarcation of “the margin”, either compositionally or contextually. On a phenomenological level, the nature of the photographs contain an element of loneliness: both in the alienation of a concrete landscape, and the loneliness of being on the social margins.
