Aline Deschamps is a Thai-French photographer at this time based mostly in Beirut, Lebanon. Passionate about geopolitics and visible arts, Deschamps’ work tackles social challenges such as identity, exile, and cultural heritage. In her newest sequence, “I Am Not Your Animal,” she follows the everyday lives of Sierra Leonean migrant domestic employees she fulfilled in Beirut in 2020, documenting their experiences in Beirut and their reintegration back into their homeland in 2022.
“The series’ title stems from the conversations I experienced with this group of women of all ages, most of whom had escaped from abusive homes and have been victims of human trafficking,” Deschamps points out. “During the exchanges, all of them shared how considerably they felt dehumanized the moment they established foot in Lebanon. One sentence kept becoming repeated: ‘They did not treat me like a human, they handled me like an animal.’”
“‘I Am Not Your Animal’ aims to translate this intersectional expertise of being a black migrant lady in Lebanon, struggling with systemic racism in a nation in which the black system is frequently reduced to a person position: the a single of a ‘servant’. It also needs to translate a more latent and private violence: the a person of getting stranded in a foreign place, and of seeking to connect the unspeakable with the families back again residence. By juxtaposing these women’s letters with their every day lifestyle photos, the job highlights their resilience identified in exile, the distressing reintegration into their culture, and the amazing bond of motherhood which enabled both of those sacrifices and the duty of survival – even with the length.”
See far more from “I Am Not Your Animal” beneath.