MOVING PORTRAITS
MOVING PORTRAITS
CREDITS
Turkish photographer Barbaros Kayan (1982) portrayed Syrian refugees who had to leave their homes in Kobani to escape to Turkey and have been settled in refugee camps. The grey, barren environments of the portraits make us aware of the poor living conditions in the camps. However, that’s not the most important concern. Kayan cuts out the refugees’ body forms and replaces them with images of Kobani’s destroyed city landscapes, combining the refugee camps and the remains of the refugees’ houses in one picture. Through this act of collage, Kayan visualizes the fear and uncertainty of life as a refugee.
In his Moving Portraits, Kayan creates a visual representation of the jarring and alienating experience refugees may go through, if and when they eventually return home. What will be waiting for them? What will have been lost, never to return?
