Public Story
• Dann' Somin: Sous le soleil, l'exclusion (Ile de La Réunion)
« Je t’amène si tu veux, je vais te montrer la misère. » Guerrier a peut-être su avant moi ce qu’au fond je tentais de comprendre.Cela faisait 15 jours que j’avais pris l’habitude de venir tous les matins dans l’un des deux seuls lieux d’accueil de jour pour les personnes en difficulté à St Pierre de la Réunion, dans la « Boutique de Solidarité de St Pierre ». Sans savoir pour autant pourquoi cet endroit m’attirait vraiment. Je n’avais alors pas d’autre but que de rencontrer, d’écouter les gens qui venaient prendre un café, de m’imprégner de leurs histoires.
Jusqu’au jour où je me suis laissé embarquer par Guerrier, comme on se laisse emmener par un guide.C’est lui qui m’a fait rencontrer les personnes qui peuplent ces photographies, toutes ces vies invisibles devant lesquelles on passe en marchant vite, comme effrayés par des spectres.J’ai rencontré la vie de Guerrier et de toutes ces personnes comme on rencontre l’inconnu.
En deux ans, je les ai vu changer – en bien parfois, mais souvent pour le pire. Les esprits et les corps ont souffert, ils se sont un peu détruits.
Cette série est le fruit de ces rencontres et la chronique impuissante de ces dégradations. C’est une porte entrouverte sur la rue, sur une réalité que nous croisons tous les jours, dont tout le monde se détourne, mais sur laquelle tout le monde a déjà prononcé son jugement. Personne ne veut savoir, personne ne veut comprendre et regarder ces vies laissées pour compte. Elles sont pourtant de plus en plus nombreuses à hanter les ruines, les friches et les zones d’ombre, à mesure que les inégalités explosent.
"I'll take you if you want, I'll show you the misery." Guerrier may have known before I did what I was trying to understand.
It had been 15 days since I had got into the habit of coming every morning to one of the only two day centres for people in difficulty in St Pierre de la Réunion, the "Boutique de Solidarité de St Pierre". Without knowing why I was really attracted to this place. I had no other aim than to meet and listen to the people who came to have a coffee, to soak up their stories.
Until the day when I let Guerrier take me on board, like a guide. It was he who introduced me to the people who populate these photographs, all these invisible lives that we walk past quickly, as if frightened by spectres. I met the life of Guerrier and all these people as one meets the unknown. In two years I have seen them change - sometimes for the better, but often for the worse. Minds and bodies have suffered, they have destroyed themselves a little.
This series is the fruit of these encounters and the impotent chronicle of these degradations. It is a half-open door on the street, on a reality that we come across every day, from which everyone turns away, but on which everyone has already passed judgment. No one wants to know, no one wants to understand and look at these lives that have been left behind. Yet more and more of them are haunting the ruins, the wastelands and the shadows as inequality explodes.
It had been 15 days since I had got into the habit of coming every morning to one of the only two day centres for people in difficulty in St Pierre de la Réunion, the "Boutique de Solidarité de St Pierre". Without knowing why I was really attracted to this place. I had no other aim than to meet and listen to the people who came to have a coffee, to soak up their stories.
Until the day when I let Guerrier take me on board, like a guide. It was he who introduced me to the people who populate these photographs, all these invisible lives that we walk past quickly, as if frightened by spectres. I met the life of Guerrier and all these people as one meets the unknown. In two years I have seen them change - sometimes for the better, but often for the worse. Minds and bodies have suffered, they have destroyed themselves a little.
This series is the fruit of these encounters and the impotent chronicle of these degradations. It is a half-open door on the street, on a reality that we come across every day, from which everyone turns away, but on which everyone has already passed judgment. No one wants to know, no one wants to understand and look at these lives that have been left behind. Yet more and more of them are haunting the ruins, the wastelands and the shadows as inequality explodes.
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