EVERYDAY IS NIGHT | JEAN-CLAUDE WICKY

Durante años, el fotógrafo suizo Jean-Claude Wicky penetró en las profundidades de las minas de Bolivia, enterrándose con los trabajadores en los laberintos de Colquiri, Viloco, Huanuni y Potosí, "donde los hombres se enfrentan con la roca y dialogan con el diablo".

"En las profundidades de las montañas bolivianas descubrí, fascinado, un diablo de arcilla llamado Tío. Es el dueño del mineral y de las vetas, que puede esconder o revelar. Este príncipe de las tinieblas tiene el poder de decidir el destino de los que invaden su territorio para apropiarse de sus riquezas. Cuando se ofende, el Tío es capaz de aplicar los castigos más terribles. Por ello, los mineros lo honran con ceremonias semanales llamadas ch'alla. Le solicitan su protección y ayuda a cambio de hojas de coca, alcohol y cigarrillos"

Between 1984 and 2001, Jean-Claude Wicky, a Swiss documentary photographer, took more than 80 photos at 30 mining centres in Bolivia. 

His pitch-black pits, faces contorted by rubble, figures teetering over perilous cliff-tops and views down shudderingly steep shafts have toured to 12 Latin American countries and 36 cities, seen by more than half a million people.

Arriving at Geevor, the tin mine which spent most of the 20th century shifting thousands of tons of black tin, they serve as a rare atmospheric parallel between Cornwall and South America.

"The similarities between the miners of Bolivia today and those of Cornwall generations ago is remarkable," says Bill Lakin, the Chair of Trustees at the mine.

"I was astonished by Jean Claude's haunting photography. No-one can fail to be moved by this stunning exhibition."

For his part, Wicky underlines the lack of health and safety the miners – ranging from children to pensioners – face in a working environment which is stiflingly hot and full of danger.

"This piece of work is my song of friendship to the people of Bolivia and all those whose daily work consists of seeking their destiny in the depths of the earth," he says.

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Jean-Claude Wicky is a Swiss documentary photographer. From 1969 to 1975 he travels around the world and makes his debuts in photography in a 22-months stay in Japan.
He lives in Moutier, Switzerland where he has his studio, but photographs mostly in South America and South East Asia.
In the 80's he gets twice the Federal grant, a grant from the State of Berne and the cultural prize of the town of Moutier.
In 1984 he begins a photo project on the Bolivian miners and visits Bolivia on a regular basis for 17 years while exploring some 30 mining centres throughout the country. This photographic work ends with the exhibition «Bolivian miners» and later the book «Bolivianminers». The exhibition was shown in 12 Latin American countries, 36 cities and was visited by over 500.000 people. It is currently in Mexico.
His work has been published in numerous magazine and newspapers including Geo Magazine and Smithsonian Magazine.
He has exhibited photographs in museums and galleries throughout Europe and Latin America. touslesjourslanuit

All images © Jean-Claude Wicky

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IN SEARCH OF A JOB – ANY JOB | JOHN HULME

Documentary Project by John Hulme

The past thirty years have seen the ever-increasing global restructure of production and investment as capital moves freely from industrial centres in Europe and North America to countries with the cheapest labour. This, in turn, has produced vast numbers of migrant workers. In fact, according to a recent United Nations International Migration and development report, there are now more than 192 million migrants, the largest number in human history.



But the free movement of finance capital stands in stark contrast to the plight of the millions of legal and “illegal” migrants throughout the world who are confronted by a myriad of border controls, racist legislation and other measures blocking their efforts to escape poverty, famine, political repression or war.



The following photographs reveal something of the problems and difficulties confronting Burmese migrant workers in Thailand—fishermen in the south-west; factory workers, and day labourers, hundreds of whom cross the Moie River on rubber inner tubes each day.



These scenes, of course, are not peculiar to Asia but are repeated in a variety of forms throughout the world—in Europe, Australia, the Americas and elsewhere—with tragic consequences.



In Thailand there are an estimated two and a half million migrants from Burma (now known as Myanmar) who have entered the country since the mid-1980s in search of a job—any job—and the hope of a better life for their families.



Thai Immigration regularly conduct sweeps or raids on construction sites rounding up all workers registered or not and put them in jail, if they want to get back quickly to their families and work then they are encouraged to pay a “Fine”.



Even though they are paid less than the minimum wage and have little freedom in Thailand it is still more than they would earn in Burma, and with a good employer life can be better than in Burma where forced labour extortionate taxes and land confiscation are common.



But life in Thailand for Burmese migrants brings new difficulties. More than half of these mainly young workers are undocumented, forced to eke out a living on rock-bottom wages and in constant fear of deportation. They are employed in dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs in Thailand’s fishing and construction industries, rubber plantations, dockyards and shrimp farms, as well as providing cheap labour for the tourist industry. Migrants without passports, official papers or sponsored jobs have to rely on labor agents, or “carrys” as they are known, who promise well-paid employment and the opportunity to send small amounts of money back home to help their families. In Burma “carrys” demand between £250 and £400 to take migrants through military and police checkpoints on both sides of the border.



Securing a work permit is difficult, time consuming and expensive, costing over £100, more than a month’s wages. And the process is complicated because the rules can change from one year to the next. Those without a work permit are deemed “illegal”, forced to take on low-paid, unsafe work and at the mercy of ruthless bosses and corrupt government officials and police. Arrest, extortion, deportation and sexual abuse are common place.
It’s my hope that some of these difficulties and tragedies facing Burmese migrants in Thailand—a microcosm of the conditions of life facing millions of migrant workers around the world—can be found in these photographs”.

All images  © JOHN HULME

About the Photographer
John Hulme is a documentary photographer dividing his time between South East Asia and Britain. His work has focused on documenting social issues in Europe, Thailand, Burma and India.
John’s work has been published in books, Magazines and newspapers, including AOL, Pacific Press (Japan), MacMillan Education, Heinemann, BBC, McGraw Hill (US), Longman Asia, Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, MacMillan Oxford, Independent On Sunday, Evans Brothers, Aladdin Books, APA Publications (Singapore), Dorling Kindersley, Financial Times and The Sydney Morning Herald.
As an accredited photographer for the BBC and Channel Four he has been involved in the production of several documentary’s, most recently for Panorama shooting Hi-8 footage of Thailand’s Chicken farms and slaughter houses.
John was invited by Kent University, Canterbury (UK) to exhibit his work. The exhibition “Burma’s Forgotten War” Images from the Thai/Burma border depicting Karen insurgents, Refugee camps and backpack medic’s, was well received, informing both students and academics about a part of the world that receives little if any, media attention.
Recent work includes the documentation of Burmese Migrant Workers, the Karen people of Burma, including their military wing, the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA). Gold Mining in Kachin state Upper Burma. And the 2010 Khumbh Mela in Haridwar India, the largest gathering of humanity on the planet.
His essay on Burmese migrant workers titled “In Search of a Job-any Job” has been widely shown including at the Foreign Correspondents club of Thailand, the Art’s centre Chiang Mai, at Oxford University’s Refugee Studies Centre, also last summer at New York’s Exit Art Gallery during their multi-media exhibition “Contemporary Slavery”.
John currently lives in Chiang Mai Northern Thailand.
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