La Jolla Beach – San Diego
The light rakes, blinding, and already, despite the morning hour, in the agitated sea black points appear and disappear in the ebb and flow of the waves. Surfers patiently wait for the swell that will carry them back finally to the beach.
Playas de Tijuana – Tijuana
The sky is gray, somber, and already, despite the morning hour, across from the tormented sea a black silhouette sticks out against the horizon. A man patiently confronts the vastness, waiting for a sign too late in coming.
The frontier between the United States and Mexico was first re-animated during the debates of the American election and then transformed into a political stake of international importance upon the investiture of Donald Trump. I am French, working in New York since the start of the presidential campaigns, and being a foreigner myself, I wanted to grasp through my own eyes this border crisis. In October 2016, I therefore went up to the wall separating the two countries. I created out of this experience the photographic project Both Sides.
In Both Sides, comprised of twenty pictures, ten diptyques compare two spaces: the beaches of San Diego (California — United States) and of Tijuana (Baja California — Mexico). On each side of the wall, I searched out correspondences and differences, identifying markers of what brings closer and pushes apart these geographically continuous spaces. While I want that each photograph be aesthetically sound and individually appreciated, I wish more that each takes on its full political, social, and emotional meaning through the contrast with its pair. This comparison inaugurates a series of reflections, spawning realizations that play at the edge of this unsettling frontier.
