Photographic Sculpture │ Iridescence by Pierre Mohamed-Petit at Dome of the Academy of Fine Arts
6 June at 16:30
“The 2015/2016 refugee crisis marked one of the most desperate movements of displaced people in modern history. Driven by the brutal escalation of the war in Syria and the violent proclamation of Daesh (ISIS) across the region, a staggering 65.3 million people were displaced worldwide by the end of 2015. Over one million refugees sought asylum in Europe by sea that year, enduring perilous journeys that claimed over 3,700 lives in the Mediterranean. As borders closed, this profound humanitarian emergency bottlenecked on the French coast in towns like Calais and Dunkirk.
It was during this period that the visual representation of the crisis radically shifted global consciousness through the photograph of the death of Alan Kurdi posted in September 2015 on Facebook. “This resulted in unprecedented expressions of sympathy and solidarity for refugees all over Europe, with many people volunteering to help,” stated UNCHR. Yet, while this surge of grassroots humanitarianism addressed the urgent need for physical survival, the deeper, existential trauma of such profound displacement was often left unseen and unanswered.
Against this vast historical backdrop, from January to April of 2016, my friend and fellow filmmaker Jacob Rawlings and I followed these grassroots humanitarian movements supporting the northern French coast refugee camps. We sought to identify entry points into these zones, immersing ourselves among those who had fled to hear and meet these women and men, leading us to documenting the makeshift refugee camp of Basroch. Returning on and off over those four months, I witnessed thousands of Kurds stalled in the mud and freezing cold, caught in a desperate waiting period as they attempted to cross the Channel to the United Kingdom. In response to the worsening conditions and local policies, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) intervened to build the first-ever official humanitarian camp on French soil, relocating those evicted from the squalid, flooded forest of Basroch. Tragically, in the chaos of this transition, many unaccompanied minors disappeared into the margins or fled to other camps.
The decade that has passed since I first documented this story gave me the distance needed to see deeper into the existential trauma inflicted by migration as a whole. Between 2016 and 2026, a relentless era of violence has triggered the largest mass movements of populations in history, driven by invasions, war, and systemic collapse. From the global pandemic confining us to our homes to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the third Sudanese Civil War, October 7 and the genocidal retaliation in Gaza, to the more recent ICE roundups in the USA and its war against Iran, the list is expansive. Crucially in all those conflicts, their destructive force has been inextricably linked to the rapid rise of technology, impacting people as well as the environment they strike. We have witnessed wars waged and visceral realities broadcast instantaneously via social media and the internet, shaping global perception in real-time. Concurrently, the machinery of war itself has been optimized by artificial intelligence through defense technology companies and AI-supported intelligence systems determining, tracking, and destroying targets. The devastation of human life is increasingly reduced to cold and calculated data points.
It is in direct response to this algorithmic detachment that this photographic sculpture emerged, aiming to illuminate an undocumented consequence of mass exodus: its profound impact on the human spirit, and its foundational desire for peace. This yellow box, containing three photographs, deliberately extends beyond the boundaries of traditional photojournalism and its traditional form. While purely historical and informative documentation is vital, it often neglects a crucial intangible dimension: the deep theological weight it imposes on people, and the personal search for meaning. These three photographs articulate this journey in three steps — a progression from a departure toward questioning and finding personal transcendence. By framing the raw reality of this camp within theological references, the yellow box asks us to look at migration not merely as a geopolitical or quantitative issue as it is so often framed in political discourse but as a profound existential questioning of what is a sanctuary in an algorithmic age.” – Pierre Mohamed-Petit
*title inspired by a painting of the same name from French painter Eric Bourguignon, definition of iridescence: the quality of showing many bright colours that change with movement.
About the Author: Pierre Mohamed-Petit
Pierre Mohamed-Petit is a French visual artist and the Production Manager at Magnum Photos in Paris. Previously, he worked closely with renowned photographer Stanley Greene and led digital initiatives and global education programs at NOOR Images in Amsterdam.