In Constant Motion
Humanity has never stopped moving. From the moment we first launched ourselves onto two legs, reaching out beyond our evolutionary cradle in the horn of Africa, our history has been marked by ceaseless travel. As a species, we have spread to the farthest reaches of the globe, in constant pursuit of new opportunities.
And yet one form of movement has always been deeply stigmatised: that of people forced to flee their place of birth, by circumstances beyond their control. From the plight of Rohingya in Myanmar, to the migrant caravans through Mexico, to the continuing refugee crisis on the shores of Europe and other examples scarcely reported, 70 million people find themselves displaced around the world today.
The scale of the problem might be unprecedented, but it’s reporting has also never been so comprehensive or sophisticated. This is thanks, in part, to a rich lineage of boundary-breaking photographers: storytellers who have innovated with form, process and technology to illustrate the issue in a host of different ways.
Take John Moore’s award-winning 2018 photograph, ‘Crying Girl on the Border’. Shot at a child’s eye level, his picture of a distraught Honduran girl, watching on as her mother is searched by US border guards, seems to embody the draconian immigration policies of the Trump administration. In its crystallisation of the faceless power that often confronts refugees, the
