Buitengesloten

For people experiencing homelessness, public space is not simply a place to pass through, but a place to live — and one where exclusion is always present. Buitengesloten (Shut Out), my graduation project at Fotoacademie Amsterdam, explores how urban space can determine who is welcome and who is not. While visible interventions designed to discourage people from staying form the starting point, the project focuses on the human experience behind them. Wandering through cities, I collect images, observations and stories from people I meet on the street. The stories do not explain the images, nor do the images illustrate the stories; together, they explore how a place can be seen, experienced and remembered in different ways, somewhere between reality, memory, longing and imagination.