Image of tear gas spreading over a group of people launching a dinghy
‘The Fight to Tackle People-Smugglers: Inside Border Security Command’,
UK Home Office publicity video 3 March 2025
‘The Fight to Tackle People-Smugglers: Inside Border Security Command’,
UK Home Office publicity video 3 March 2025
‘Boy in front of silhouette of CRS policeman holding tear gas canister.
After leaving my country of Sudan in 2023 because of war, I started to tell my story and express the human experience.
This piece speaks about refugees, dignity and survival in a world shaped by power and corruption.’
Emad Abdullah Ahmed.
After leaving my country of Sudan in 2023 because of war, I started to tell my story and express the human experience.
This piece speaks about refugees, dignity and survival in a world shaped by power and corruption.’
Emad Abdullah Ahmed.
BBC report from beach as police slash migrant 'taxi-boat' and young child is crying in visible distress.
After intervention from a migrants’ rights organisation the video was subsequently blurred,
but remains in it's original form on BBC tiktok page.
4 July 2025
After intervention from a migrants’ rights organisation the video was subsequently blurred,
but remains in it's original form on BBC tiktok page.
4 July 2025
Image from the introduction to Border Force Maritime Command Centre
. ‘MCC Operation DEVERAN Standard Operating Procedures’
Operation DEVERAN is the Border Force led response at sea to the threat of either opportunistic and/or facilitated illegal migration,
seeking to breach or evade UK border controls using small craft, fishing vessels or yachts.
It covers the tactical and operational response to deliver the Joint Action Plan for combating illegal migration involving
small boats in the eastern Channel agreed between the UK and French Governments and signed on 24 January 2019.
25 May 2021
Operation DEVERAN is the Border Force led response at sea to the threat of either opportunistic and/or facilitated illegal migration,
seeking to breach or evade UK border controls using small craft, fishing vessels or yachts.
It covers the tactical and operational response to deliver the Joint Action Plan for combating illegal migration involving
small boats in the eastern Channel agreed between the UK and French Governments and signed on 24 January 2019.
25 May 2021
Tempête selected images from longer sequence experiments.
Work in progress; long term project researching the UK/ France border & what is often termed by the UK press ‘small boats’ migration.
The work comprises different stories which overlap, clash and sometimes contradict; like the true crisis of complexity on the Côte d'Opale. The co-existence of banality and violence is palpable. There are metres between the everyday dog walker or tourist swimmer and those seeking ‘sanctuary’ in illegal flimsy boats.
The work juxtaposes what I have ‘witnessed’ & the testimony of those seeking asylum who have ‘experienced’ the border zone. It also incorporates objects and archival material to critique the representation of the border and to shine a light on hidden power structures of the state.
New work developing the project seeks to expand representation and work with other authors with lived experience of the crossings. The act of returning and the ‘repatriation of work’ * as both an ethical act and to find greater meaning is integral to the process.
Ongoing questions direct the project:
How does it feel to put your child in a boat for safety? As the Warsan Shire poem says ' no one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land’.
How can a project using photography, an inheritently extractive & colonial medium ethically represent the experiences of those making this crossing?
Whilst also documenting ‘evidence’ and providing a narrative about the hidden aspects of a subject so significant in UK socio- political history ? The ‘small boats’ crossings are so politically loud and socially divisive, yet UK visualisation of the border is limited and singular in aesthetic.
How does the State control an open border in a leisure and tourism terrain? Whilst ‘protecting’ its border for the ‘safety’ of its citizens; to what extent is the state prepared to commit violence to 'others'?
Ethical Statement:
Ongoing relationships built through volunteering with migrant solidarity organisations are integral to making the work.
I acknowledge the complexity of this territory and the inherent power imbalances. I have received training from advocacy leadership at NGOs working with families at the border and I draw on this and my experiences of volunteering with the community when out photographing and hearing testimony. I don’t feel that I could began to take photographs on the beaches without also contributing to improving the situation for people on the move. By spending long periods of time in this space, I build trust. I never photograph faces at the border, I make it clear what I am doing through open gesture and if consent is not given; I don’t lift my camera.
Testimony has been provided anonymously from people I have ongoing relationships with. I explain clearly where this will be used and ask for permission. Informed consent is an ongoing dialogue and can be withdrawn at any time.
The work can live in multiple contexts to incite debate and hopes for change to human rights and conditions at the border. Photographs have been included in border violence reports advocating for a UK Parliamentary review of financial spending and human rights at the border.
* Susan Meiselas ‘In History & Documentary Photography’ 2008
The work comprises different stories which overlap, clash and sometimes contradict; like the true crisis of complexity on the Côte d'Opale. The co-existence of banality and violence is palpable. There are metres between the everyday dog walker or tourist swimmer and those seeking ‘sanctuary’ in illegal flimsy boats.
The work juxtaposes what I have ‘witnessed’ & the testimony of those seeking asylum who have ‘experienced’ the border zone. It also incorporates objects and archival material to critique the representation of the border and to shine a light on hidden power structures of the state.
New work developing the project seeks to expand representation and work with other authors with lived experience of the crossings. The act of returning and the ‘repatriation of work’ * as both an ethical act and to find greater meaning is integral to the process.
Ongoing questions direct the project:
How does it feel to put your child in a boat for safety? As the Warsan Shire poem says ' no one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land’.
How can a project using photography, an inheritently extractive & colonial medium ethically represent the experiences of those making this crossing?
Whilst also documenting ‘evidence’ and providing a narrative about the hidden aspects of a subject so significant in UK socio- political history ? The ‘small boats’ crossings are so politically loud and socially divisive, yet UK visualisation of the border is limited and singular in aesthetic.
How does the State control an open border in a leisure and tourism terrain? Whilst ‘protecting’ its border for the ‘safety’ of its citizens; to what extent is the state prepared to commit violence to 'others'?
Ethical Statement:
Ongoing relationships built through volunteering with migrant solidarity organisations are integral to making the work.
I acknowledge the complexity of this territory and the inherent power imbalances. I have received training from advocacy leadership at NGOs working with families at the border and I draw on this and my experiences of volunteering with the community when out photographing and hearing testimony. I don’t feel that I could began to take photographs on the beaches without also contributing to improving the situation for people on the move. By spending long periods of time in this space, I build trust. I never photograph faces at the border, I make it clear what I am doing through open gesture and if consent is not given; I don’t lift my camera.
Testimony has been provided anonymously from people I have ongoing relationships with. I explain clearly where this will be used and ask for permission. Informed consent is an ongoing dialogue and can be withdrawn at any time.
The work can live in multiple contexts to incite debate and hopes for change to human rights and conditions at the border. Photographs have been included in border violence reports advocating for a UK Parliamentary review of financial spending and human rights at the border.
* Susan Meiselas ‘In History & Documentary Photography’ 2008