Idomeni Camp, Greece

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Idomeni Camp, Greece

Artist Richard Mosse (Irish, born 1980)

Date2016

Dimensions40 × 120 in. (101.6 × 304.8 cm)
Frame: 42 1/4 × 122 × 2 in. (107.3 × 309.9 × 5.1 cm)

MediumDigital c-print on metallic paper (Optium plexi, Duratrans film backed with Dibond)

ClassificationPhotographs

Credit LineWilliam J. Hitchcock Fund in memory of Grace J. Hitchcock

Object number

2017.19

Not on View

Label TextRichard Mosse situates his photographic approach between documentary journalism and contemporary art practice. His work fits into a growing body of contemporary photography that documents marginalized peoples in the 21st-century global economy. Mosse focuses on war-torn regions, capturing the effects of conflict on landscapes and people, often in haunting, cinematic images. Idomeni Camp, Greece is part of his series of panoramic images, titled "Heat Maps," that uses a military-grade heat camera to record human and animal activity. The camera was originally designed as a surveillance tool to identify and track enemy targets, but Mosse re-purposes it to document the displacement of refugees living in camps across Europe. Constructed from hundreds of frames blended into a single expansive thermal panorama, this image depicts a tableau of small groups of figures rendered as glowing silhouettes. The composite image reduces its subjects into biological traces to call attention to the plight of the stateless refugee who has been denied his/her essential human rights. Mosse explains that he seeks to represent the unrepresentable, to “help us begin to describe, and thereby account for, what exists at the limits of human articulation."Published ReferencesO'Hagan, Sean, "Prix Pictet 2017: Richard Mosse wins prize with heat-map shots of refugees", in The Guardian, 4 May 2017, a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/may/04/prix-pictet-2017-richardmosse-wins-prize-heat-maprefugees-incoming-v-anda">www.theguardian.com/artanddesi...a> Campbell, Max, "Richard Mosse's 'Heat Maps': A Military-Grade Camera Repurposed on the Migrant Trail," in The New Yorker, 5 February 2017, a href="http://www.newyorker.com/ culture/photo-booth/richard-mosses-heat-maps-a-military-gradecamera- repurposed-on-the-migrant-trail">www.newyorker.com/ culture/phot...a>Exhibition HistoryNew York, Jack Shainman Gallery, Heat Maps, February 2 - March 11, 2017.