Cut-Out Europe (2025)
Art book, Collage
Three European politicians awkwardly shaking hands with the Tunisian President Kais Saied. This image is the starting point for a visual exploration into the formal facade of the EU migration policies.
The picture is celebrating the signing of the “Memorandum of Understanding” between Team Europe and Tunisia in July 2023. The Memorandum was described by Ursula von der Leyen as a “blueprint” for future agreements with other states along the EU’s external border. A quick Google search reveals all the states it has now - two years - later served as such: Mauritania, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, North Macedonia, and Albania.
This book is a dissection of these images and the three agreements themselves. Cutting them out, flag by flag, chair by chair, and word by word, shows their interchangeability, embellishment, and dramaturgy. What is hidden behind the ceremonious photos or the nice-sounding words is the harsh and deadly reality of the EU border regime.
Since the early 2000s, the EU has practiced a process called border externalisation. Through agreements like the one with Tunisia, the EU, frankly speaking, pays states like Tunisia to keep migrants from arriving at the EU’s external borders, no matter the means it takes. It comes at the cost of those that the EU deems less worthy, who are unable to enjoy the freedom to travel that those inside the EU celebrate.
As such, this book is also a call to take these agreements apart, look behind their façade, and question at what price our freedom of movement actually comes.
The picture is celebrating the signing of the “Memorandum of Understanding” between Team Europe and Tunisia in July 2023. The Memorandum was described by Ursula von der Leyen as a “blueprint” for future agreements with other states along the EU’s external border. A quick Google search reveals all the states it has now - two years - later served as such: Mauritania, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, North Macedonia, and Albania.
This book is a dissection of these images and the three agreements themselves. Cutting them out, flag by flag, chair by chair, and word by word, shows their interchangeability, embellishment, and dramaturgy. What is hidden behind the ceremonious photos or the nice-sounding words is the harsh and deadly reality of the EU border regime.
Since the early 2000s, the EU has practiced a process called border externalisation. Through agreements like the one with Tunisia, the EU, frankly speaking, pays states like Tunisia to keep migrants from arriving at the EU’s external borders, no matter the means it takes. It comes at the cost of those that the EU deems less worthy, who are unable to enjoy the freedom to travel that those inside the EU celebrate.
As such, this book is also a call to take these agreements apart, look behind their façade, and question at what price our freedom of movement actually comes.