Set in an imagined present in which a bridge spans the Strait of Gibraltar, Atlantropa mixes fact and fiction by connecting the bridge to contemporary news reports and to a modernist architect's vision: to dam the Strait and create a new continent. Originally intended as a symbol of unity between Africa and Europe, the bridge is eventually seized by EU forces and takes on a completely different meaning. The Gilbraltar Bridge, first mentioned in science fiction by Arthur C. Clarke, has more recently been investigated as an actual possibility by the United Nations.
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22 Archival description results for Fronteras
Ceuta, which has always been governed by the right, is the door to Europe for thousands of sub-Saharan migrants. This was the first demonstration supporting migrants in Ceuta, one of the North African enclaves in Spain, organized by many different European organizations and individuals after the murder by shooting of more than 14 black Africans as they tried to cross the border fence.
Prodein, a Melilla-based children's rights association, documents the difficult situation of sub Saharans who try to cross the border between Africa and Europe in search of a better life. “Murder” is the best way to describe the deaths that took place - and continue to take place - on the border at Melilla and Ceuta. The summary shooting of all migrants who attempt to climb the fence... “with their backs turned and defenceless, without previous arrest, without administrative or legal proceedings” can only be called “murder”.
"Stranger is the one that is always asked: ”Where are you from, brother?” or is asked ”Is it hot in your country?” He doesn't care about details concerning the people in the country he is or about their domestic politics'. But he's the first one to suffer its consequences. He may not be happy when they are happy but he's always afraid when they are afraid". Mourid Barghouti
UntitledSomething happened on the Spanish-Moroccan border in Autumn 2005. A thing that is still happening today in other places and in other ways. Hundreds of sub-Saharans used ladders to cross a European border. Weapons, rubber bullets, death. Thousands were deported to the Sahara desert. Death. Spanish television broadcast images of an accelerated war. Just bodies, not individuals. Something we watched. Returning to the place where it all happened we find nothing but empty space. A landscapes without traces. What remains, that fence. How is it possible to create new representations that don't get lost in the oversaturation of images that present migrants as victims? Others had already asked themselves the same question. A group of Congolese refugees is stuck in Morocco waiting to reach Europe. They have created a theatre piece based on their experiences of migration. In the room where they live each day, it takes shape as a self-representation of each step along the path. But it is not a finished work. There is no audience and no stage, just a work waiting for its ending.
Europlex tracks distinct cross-border activities through the Spanish-Moroccan borderland and seeks to make these obscure paths visible. On their repetitive circuit around the check-point to the Spanish enclave Ceuta, the video follows in three borderlogs the smuggling women who strap multiple layers of clothes to their bodies; the daily commute of "domesticas" who turn into time travellers as they move back and forth between the Moroccan and European time zones; and the Moroccan women working in the transnational zones in Northafrica for the European market. All these trajectories move around and in between the imperative of the territorial borders. They form, however, a vital layer of the cultural and economic space between Europe and Africa.
The idea for this short / interview arises from research work on youth and migration. From this interview, we want to focus on migration as a global and timeless phenomenon. Our intention is for the viewer to understand that young people share similar interests, expectations and objectives like access to studies, a job, a stable and safe home ... Even though the phenomenon of migration is complex and we must take many factors into account, with this video we want to continue eliminating prejudices and rejection of migrants from all over the world, understanding that their objectives are not different from those of ours, but that many times in their countries of origin their integrity is compromised and violated and their opportunities to access a better life are limited, and therefore it is necessary to undertake a trip. In this interview, Juliana tells us what prompted her migratory path, the unstable situation in which she lived, the opportunities she has had and her goals: to find a job, continue her studies, take care of her family ..., while she tells us how his grandfather was also a young migrant during World War II, in search of a better future. Showing us how cycles repeat themselves and that it is necessary to create mechanisms and networks so that young people can emigrate in dignified and safe conditions. This video is part of the Educational Agreement of collaboration between theOVNI Archives and the Department of Anthropology of the University of Barcelona - UAB , for the curricular external practices of the students, of the academic year 2020-2021. work pdf
On the border, the line as principle of property and belonging reaches an extreme dimension where it physically defines the sphere of its relations. Those who transgress it reconstruct these imaginary lines on a daily basis, redefining the traditional geography and occupying the non-spaces where others live in a temporary form of existence. These others, the non-citizens, are phantasmtic, exchangeable parts of a flexible market. Made invisible, they are permanently controlled persons. Under the pretext of a greater civilian security, they are kept clear from the public spaces reserved for the citizens with rights and pushed into non-public spaces, which are run by state and military surveillance, multinational operations servicing a European market and non-governmental organisations.
UntitledJune 2005, the forest of Benyounes in Morocco, 2 km from the fence that separates Ceuta from Morocco. As happens every week, we come across African citizens who are hoping that here they will find an opportunity to cross into Spanish territory, into Europe. Two people from our collective meet with our working group and we talk about many things that worry and affect us. After sharing our stories, we decide to make a documentary that will show the realities that we experience in Morocco as a country of transit.
In Benyounes forest, “la foret” as they called their habitants, was the last stage of a long trip for thousands of people coming from Sub-Saharan Africa. Close to the fence that divides Ceuta (Spain) from Morocco, they establish in a variable time, before flank the last obstacle in they way to Europe, looking for a better life. Sometimes running away from wars, politics persecutions, hunger or a precarious economy situation. Lots of times of all of this. In years, the migrants pass across this forest and after some weeks or months they manage to arrive to Ceuta. In finals of 2004, European union start agreements of subcontract Morocco in the control of the Spanish – Moroccan border. The habitants of the forest, started to feel the effects of this agreements: the increase of illegal devolutions, the abuses from the civil police, they install police controls near the forest, they forbid the access to current water, military attacks to the camps in with they made mass arrests and rapes as a war weapon. The border it's close. Systematic violation of human rights, financed with the tax of the democratic European Union citizens. The migrants organize themselves in spaces like this and construct spaces; support nets in Moroccan territory, confronting and resisting this way the European politics. In the forest of Benyounes, they organized themselves from origin communities. In February of 2005, decided between all the community's, record this video, to made visible their situation, in with they report the systematic violation of their human rights, the absolutely abandonment from the NGO's, Associations an Human Rights Institutions, an they demand their citizens condition and they require their rights as human beings.
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