1st Moments

The project “1st Moments” aims to demonstrate the diversity of expression amongst those seeking safety and peace in the EU, those who paid between €1000 and €2000 each, to cross the Aegean Sea to Greece in small boats from Turkey.

It is an exhausting trip, taking an average of 90 minutes (if everything goes to plan), marked by fear and great expectations about what will be found at journey's end.

After arriving on the beach in Lesbos these individuals must walk from 1 to 20 km to reach the “registration check point,” in order to be able to continue their journey northward. This walk takes so long that expressions of joy, faith, liberty, exhaustion, anxiety, relief and contentment are shown on everyone's faces…

My aim was to photograph each person as a separate entity, with his or her own expressions and reactions, not just as a part in a mass movement. This was what drove me to portray a few of the millions of refugees in this bay. I wanted to highlight a moment, in which a unique soul finds the will to carry on.