The project addresses the issue of the over-representation of vulnerable people in the Swiss prison system. Through in-depth conversations with incarcerated people and contributions from academics, it highlights how poverty and migration are systematically criminalized, and how prison functions as a tool of exclusion.

Developed at La Promenade prison (EDPR), the project is the result of a collaborative process in which incarcerated individuals created pinhole and cyanotype images from within the prison walls. This gave them a space for self-expression and allowed them to become co-authors and experts of their own realities. At the same time, excerpts from their testimonies were engraved in concrete, confronting the silence of prison architecture with the rawness of carceral graffiti.

This work aims to provoke critical reflection on the prison system and its inherent deficiencies, challenging the societal norms and policies that criminalize poverty and migration.

The project was developed as part of the Neuchâtel Photographic Investigation Grant 2023.