“The biggest step that we can take today is to start collectively thinking of housing as less of a commodity that should be traded and speculated, and more as a basic human right,” stated Portuguese documentarian Gonçalo Fonseca at Xposure International Photography Festival, which concluded yesterday at Expo Centre Sharjah.
In a session titled, ‘Documenting a housing crisis’, the photographer shared visuals of the gradual gentrification of Portuguese localities that led to the eviction of vulnerable sections such as the elderly and young single mothers. The Lisbon-based photographer, who has won numerous awards, had earlier worked on long-term projects in Portugal, Morocco, China, and India.
The ‘New Lisbon project’ commenced in 2018 as he sought to study the effect of gentrification on the city’s inhabitants. “I realised I was making much better pictures spending time inside people’s homes, documenting their inner spaces and showcasing how they felt, rather than photographing tourists on the streets,” said Fonseca.
“I felt specially connected with young single mothers who had no option but to squat in abandoned housing units as a way of providing a roof over their children’s heads,” said the photographer, who worked with grassroots activists to provide legal support to those evicted by powerful landlords.
Fonseca maintains touch with almost everyone who have shared their life stories with him and said that the social and economic crises following Covid-19 has further worsened the housing crisis in the Portuguese capital.
Cities as soap operas
In his presentation, ‘The Individual & Community’, British photographer George Georgiou said: “When we move about a city, observing it in great detail, we will see many mini soap operas in motion.”
Showcasing images from Turkey, London and the US, the winner of two World Press Photo awards discussed one of the central themes and concerns of his work – the complexities of the individual in relation to community and the urban public space.
His photos from the Last Stop project – shot through the windows of London’s double decker buses, show how the streets of the city wear different looks at different times of the day. He explained: “The essence of ‘Last Stop’ is that you might take the same route everyday but what you see - the ebb and flow on the street takes on a random nature like a series of fleeting mini soap operas.”
Regaling the audience with stories behind some of his most iconic clicks in the series, ‘Americans Parade’, Georgiou described it as an exhaustive body of work in black and white that was in the making for almost five years. He said: “It is a parade of Americans. One after the other, from one community to the next, building up a picture of Americans in the United States in 2016 - a year when America’s divisions had never been more pronounced.”
The British photographer also spoke about his work in Turkey, which forms part of Fault Lines: Turkey East West. “Turkey is forever said to be at the crossroads of the East and the West but what is East what is West?” he asked, while showcasing some of his select works from the country that best showed its role as a bridge between cultures and religions and its duality - modernity alongside traditions, and East alongside West.
