The Reverie Project

Martina Bacigalupo + Sharon Sliwinski

Created in partnership with a migrant community centre in Geneva, Switzerland, The Reverie Project (2018) aims to counter the mass media’s mode of representing the migrant crisis as spectacle. Foregrounding the life of the mind, these video portraits offer a glimpse into the community of La Roseraie—a migrant reception centre located in a city that is also home of the 1951 Refugee Convention, the international treaty that defines who a refugee is and sets out the responsibilities of nations that grant asylum.

The complexity and scale of the global migrant crisis has opened an unprecedented political quandary that has captured the attention of politicians, policy makers, and the public. But it has also opened critical questions about our image-making practices: Do we need images showing the violation of human dignity in order to capture the public’s attention? Or do such images themselves constitute a violation of human dignity?

The Reverie Project’s quiet, intimate portraits ask viewers to consider both the subject’s “right to an image” as well as her “right to opacity,” to borrow a concept from Martiniquan poet and philosopher Édouard Glissant. Through subtle movements, expressions, and micro gestures, the camera captures private moments of contemplation in a situation in which the right to privacy is one of the first rights that migrants lose. Where does the mind go when given the opportunity to wander freely?

Overall, The Reverie Project highlights the importance of the imaginary realm and shows how human rights are intimately connected to our ways of seeing.