Location: VARIOUS

Like waves on the sea tells the story of EMERGENCY’s ship Life Support and its first year of search and rescue missions out on the Mediterranean Sea, one of the world’s deadliest migration routes. Trying to stop migration is like trying to turn back the tide. Just like the sea’s waves, people will move as they have always moved. We humans are driven by our need and desire for a better life. We want to live in countries that protect rights, dignity, freedom – places where our needs and aspirations are recognised and protected. We are on a journey. The movement of people, of peoples, is part of the history of mankind. No barrier can stop it. There are no barriers when EMERGENCY is out saving men and women at sea; we touch hands and look into each other’s eyes in acknowledgement. We embrace, cry and smile. When we meet the people we save at sea we get to the very heart of our work: helping those in need and not passing by on the other side. This is what we have done at EMERGENCY since our founding. Whether at sea or on land, we will never sit still in the face of indifference and constant violation of international law. Pictures by Giulio Piscitelli, Gabriele Micalizzi, Dario Bosio, Davide Preti, Francesco De Scisciolo, Giorgio Dirindin. Exhibition design and art direction theBuss.

ABOUT 

Giulio Piscitelli

Working as a photojournalist since 2010, he has reported on the coup in Egypt and on the wars in Syria, Iraq and Ukraine. His long-standing project about the migration crisis in Europe led to a book, Harraga: On the road, burning borders (Contrasto, 2017). His work has appeared in publications in Italy and abroad, including L’Espresso, Internazionale, Io Donna, The New York Times, Newsweek, La Stampa, Stern, Time, Vanity Fair and Vrij.

Gabriele Micalizzi

 A reporter specialising in war photojournalism, he has also worked on long-lasting social, anthropological and ethnographic projects, always maintaining his own particular outlook. He works with publications in Italy and abroad, including The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Wall Street Journal, Time, The Guardian, Vice UK, Le Monde, Rolling Stone Italia, Internazionale, Die Zeit, Il Corriere Della Sera, La Repubblica, La Stampa, Esquire and Ruptly.

Dario Bosio

He has photographed for a range of companies, including NOOR Images, 10b Photography and Metrography. He is one of the authors of the Map of Displacement project. He has also worked for publications and broadcasters like Time, Condé Nast, Internazionale, Al Jazeera, Politiken, the BBC, La Repubblica and RSI. He works with the UNHCR and various NGOs (EMERGENCY, Save the Children and Minority Rights Group). His images tend to tell very short stories, in a visual language that relies on participation and further work after photography. He teaches reportage at the Istituto Europeo di Design in Turin.

 Davide Preti

 He is a film-maker and visual journalist whose work looks at the consequences of war, at migration and socio-economic inequality. His reports have appeared in Italian newspapers, like Internazionale and Il Corriere della Sera, and in media abroad, like Al Jazeera English and ABC Australia. He teaches visual journalism and video-making at IULM University in Milan. 

Francesco De Scisciolo

An architect by profession, in 2007 he began taking photos in order to paint pictures, but soon found himself using the camera as a means of research, narration and condemnation. He addresses social and environmental topics, like the shantytowns of Southern Italy, the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on people and cities, or the beauty lost when the Xylella bacterium blighted Apulia’s thousand-year-old olive trees. In Milan in 2019, he founded the cultural association neverland u.t.w., an open workshop where people can come up with independent projects of visual art and architecture.

Giorgio Dirindin

While studying at the Istituto Europeo di Design in Milan, he documented the earthquakes in Albania in 2019 and the wildfires in Sardinia in 2021. In 2022 he reported on the war between Ukraine and Russia and the living conditions of Bedouin communities in Gaza and the West Bank. Since 2020 he has worked at Cesura as an assistant to photo-reporter Gabriele Micalizzi. His photos have been published in La Stampa, Il Corriere della Sera, La Repubblica and magazines like Rolling Stone and INCF. He has exhibited his work at joint shows in Brescia, Milan and at the Bayeux–Calvados photo-journalism festival.