Exiles, migrants, asylum seekers ... thousands of people arrive in France to apply for asylum and find themselves living in makeshift camps like here in Saint-Denis. Because often they do not benefit from the support of the public authorities, although it is their duty. Without accommodation, without the possibility of quickly submitting their demand, they live in unworthy conditions on the streets of Paris or other cities in France. They depend on food aid from associations.

Between summer and November 2020, nearly 3,000 people, Afghans, Sudanese, Ethiopians… gradually arrived in this camp located in Saint-Denis-Porte de Paris (Seine-Saint-Denis). Installed on the esplanade of the Stade de France, they suffered from the cold, deficiencies, illnesses, but also thefts and assaults. Indeed, small gangs are setting up in the camp to operate a business of various drugs and cigarettes. Over the weeks, however, solidarity was organized and made it possible to share meals, blankets, a place in a tent, useful administrative information ... But without food, medical or administrative aid associations, the living conditions of these exiles would have been untenable.

This slideshow, set to music by Hossein Soltani at the tanbûr, shows moments of life between mid-August and November 17, 2020, the day of the brutal evacuation of the camp by the police.

I spent 24 hours with the Paris Fire Brigade at the Bitche barracks (19th arrondissement) in April 2015. There was no spectacular intervention but I discovered a daily practice, rigorous physical, repetitions of maneuvering gestures, interventions with a homeless man assaulted in the street, a high school student in the throes of a panic attack, a man fearing to have had a heart attack...

Through this sound-slideshow, I hope to restore something of the atmosphere that I shared with the Paris firefighters, men (there is no firefighter women in Bitche) whose motto is "Save or Perish ”and whose commitment confronts them day and night with social misery and danger. This work was commissioned by the daily newspaper La Croix.