First light (Migration in the Swiss Alps)

From August 2016 I had the opportunity to work on a photographic project, for a couple of months, for SMART the Sustainable Mountain Art Programme, raising awareness about the topic of migration in the Swiss mountain regions. I stayed in the tinny village of Medergen, 2000m above sea level and learnt about the history of Swiss migration as fas back as the 1300s and involving a group of people named the Walsers who are known for building houses in a certain style and establishing many traditions that are still celebrated today. Hiking down the mountain to the closest village with a train station (still no shop) stands an old ski hotel, nowadays used as a home for about 100 asylum seekers from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Siria, Sudan, and many other countries, awaiting their fate and status of their passport, to hear if they will be accepted to stay or perhaps be deported back to their countries of war. During my project I was exposed to these two very diverse groups of people, the one being a deeply established culture, yet rooted in migration (even today there is still a seasonal migration happening called 'trans-humance' involving people and their animals moving up and down the mountains as the seasons change) and on the other hand, the modern day asylum seekers hoping for the status of refugee. Through my project I wish to make the two groups look to each other and find respect and interest in the other and ways to get along as a richer society on the whole.