Broken Screen

The blind live in a sighted world. They have to function in a system constructed on the rules of seeing. “Blindness” comes up in the title of songs, books and movies. It’s a metaphor, a symbol, but also the greatest fear of many people, and this is allegedly why our shallow fascination with blindness is rarely strong enough to encourage meaningful interactions. For the blind the result is often disconnection, loneliness and a towering rate of unemployment, which reveals the discrepancy between a constantly changing world and the persistence of ancient stigmas. When I began this project, fear was my starting point. Following a few storylines, I was trying to imagine myself in the position of the ones I photographed, forced to reinvent my identity and relation to the world after years of a sighted life. Filtered through blindness, the core questions of identity, love, work and independence feel even more compelling.