LIMINAL, Forensic Oceanography, Border Forensics

Surveillance operations in the Mediterranean have shifted from the water to the air at the initiative of Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency. Maritime patrols have been bolstered by a broad arsenal of aerial surveillance aircraft – a private fleet of planes and drones assembled to more effectively push back migrants, who face systematic, widespread violence.

From Sea to Sky exposes these aggressive methods through the complementary approaches of three activist groups: LIMINAL, a laboratory for research on border violence; Border Forensics, an organization that analyzes this violence using spatial and visual methods; and Forensic Oceanography, a project that investigates the maritime borders of the European Union in the Mediterranean Sea. More than 40,000 migrants have lost their life in the sea over the past 30 years, victim to what Forensic Oceanography has termed “liquid violence.”

Created for CENTQUATRE-PARIS and the Festival d’Automne, From Sea to Sky is a documentary installation that draws from data analysis and images, along with video, sound and cartographic works, to reveal how the Mediterranean maritime space has become a militarized border zone.