Seba Kurtis
"THICKER THAN WATER"

Exhibition: 20 January – February 24, 2016
Opening: Wednesday, 20 January, 6:30pm

Born in Buenos Aires in 1974, Seba Kurtis studied journalism and became a political activist after a childhood under the influence of the ruling military junta. In 2001, Argentina was hit by a major political and economic crisis, which forced Kurtis to leave for Spain, where he lived illegally for five years. This experience is at the heart of his artistic approach, which focuses on the underlying dynamics of illegal migration and its impact on culture, society and individuals. His work has recently been shown at Pôle Images Haute-Normandie (France) and at Christophe Guye Gallery (Zurich).

The starting point for Seba Kurtis’ work "THICKER THAN WATER" is his personal experience of exile and clandestinity, as well as the people he has met over the years. His approach consists of adding coloured filters and graphic subterfuge, and manipulating exposure, colours and textures during the development of his photographs.

These "interventions" enable him to highlight the mechanics of identity erasure and dehumanisation that are at work in migratory processes, and to comment on this phenomenon: colorimetric manipulations that imitate human detection systems used at borders, immersion of negatives in salt water to represent sea crossings – often dangerous and sometimes fatal – and collages to mask faces and signify migrants’ loss of identity.

With the title "Thicker Than Water", the exhibition presents five series created since 2008. "Shoebox" (2008) is a family archive of Super-8 films. Kept in a shoebox at the time of leaving for Europe, they are water-damaged. This damage is a metaphor for the impact of financial crisis on the life of families. Water is the series’ leitmotiv: the sea inspires hope and despair, it brings together and tears apart, sometimes causing death and destruction.

"A Few Days More" (2008) addresses migration from Egypt to Europe and the longer roads of exile (and increased risks) that result from tighter border control. For "Drowned" (2008), Kurtis photographs the shores of the Canary Islands, where boats coming from Africa land. Before developing the pictures, he "drowns" the negatives in the same water that often kills those who attempt the crossing.

"Thicker Than Water" (2012), which gives its name to the exhibition, focuses on detection systems used by UK Border Control: heartbeat and breathing detectors used on lorries and trailers, which can detect human presence in a matter of minutes.

Finally, "Talcum" (2015) is the first chapter of a residency Kurtis did in a refugee camp near Cherbourg. The coast and horizon, which inspire fantasies of a new life, stand in dramatic contrast with the walled and oppressive environment within the camp. Here, collage interferes with traditional family portraits. Faces are lost in the brightness and layers of coloured talc. This manipulation refers to an article in the local press, which ran the headline "Hidden in a lorry full of talc". From this minor news item, Kurtis draws on this symbolical substance. The masked faces express the enforced quest for invisibility that is necessary to survive in migratory situations.

Far from documentary photography, Seba Kurtis finds experimental photographic means that become the many metaphors for the difficulties that migrants experience. All in all, his pictures endure the same fate as the people he portrays.

In 2011, Seba Kurtis took part in Vevey International Photography Award, organised by the Festival Images.