A man, hiding in a knitted orange cloth that flutters around him like a tent cloth, walks along an asphalt road. He is surrounded by fences. Where is he heading to? Then another image attracts attention: the border, hermetically closed with barbed wire. In any case, the traveler does not pass here. It is clear: he is on his way, but not welcome. Gallery Bart presents Transit by Henk Wildschut (1967, NL), an exhibition about refugees who often only reach their destination in their dreams.
Henk has been photographing the journey of groups of displaced persons for over fifteen years. He has always focused on the resilience of people and the humanity of the anonymous refugee. The iconic images of makeshift gardens for the tents in a UN camp or a cardboard church near Calais are well known. Reflecting on this and on the current war situation, Henk makes a major comment on this earlier work. Times have changed, but maybe he has too. Hope gives way to doubts about the uncertain future. Despite the power that lies in the way in which these refugees build something up in their situation, their situation itself should not disappear from the picture. Henk now tells this story with a selection of known, unknown, old and new photos. Because as long as he has been laying down the camps, nothing substantial has changed. The waves of migration are the tide, but the dikes are high.