From Friday, January 26 through Saturday, March 17, 2018, the Passage Sainte-Croix in Nantes is showing L’Odyssée de l’errance (The Wandering Odyssey), a photo and video exhibition by Oliver Jobard and Claire Billet.
It has been more than ten years that photographer Olivier Jobard shared the journey of migrants, from south to north and east to west on this planet. For days and months, he joined a man, a family, a departing group; crossed mountains, deserts, and borders; embarked with them on rafts of doom, taking on the challenge of being close to the people.
Claire Billet, journalist and filmmaker, follows migrants in her video reports, sometimes with the camera hidden, sometimes not. Her film Comme une pluie de parfum tells the odyssey of five young Afghanis, she followed from Kabul to Paris in 2015.
Their reports show the voyage, the fatigue, the fears, the endless waiting, and the illusions of those who, once arrived, confront a reality much different from what they had imagined.
In L’Odyssée de l’errance, through images of the long journeys of a young, illegal, migrant from Cameroon, a Syrian family fleeing the war and five Afghani migrants, Olivier Jobard and Claire Billet give a face to the thousands of refugees cast into exile. It is a poignant exhibition of the great humanitarian challenges confronting Europe today.
For both, the objective is to bring justice to those anonymous men, women, and children on the long path to Europe in search for a better life. “We hope to show you another look at immigration, not falling in the large numbers, but tell the story of these people,” explains Olivier Jobard.
These beings are not heroes. They appear with all their complexity, with all their fragility. But, at least, for those photographed or filmed by Olivier Jobard and Claire Billet, we no longer speak of migrants. They have a name. They are called Ahmad, Jihane, Kingsley…
Olivier Jobard et Claire Billet, L’odyssée de l’errance
From January 26 through March 17, 2018
Passage Sainte-Croix
9, rue de la Bâclerie
44000 Nantes
France
www.passagesaintecroix.fr
