A brief history of sight

This series is about mobility, about the types of relationships we have with places we go through. It’s about this particular space where mental territories meet geographical ones. It’s about how our specific position in the society often contributes to define where, for some of us, we are told to live. Representations about Gypsy and Roma people still reinforce the nomadism as an exclusive defining trait, even though most people have nothing to do with these practices. On top of this, no other social group in France has suffered as many injunctions to immobility since the end of the XIXth century. In 1990, a law finally passed stating that every city with at least 5.000 inhabitants must provide a site where french Gypsy people can stay. In negative, his law has made any other parking option illegal everywhere in France. It seems then that the landscapes in which these sites are planned, bear the mark of these constraints : waste centers, landfills, cement plants, chemical plants, power plants, quarries, highways, railways, airports, etc. One thing in particular strikes the eye once in such a site: the gaze can never wander very far, one can rarely see the horizon.