Immense prayer

[...]For those who travel in a stubborn and contrary direction
with its special mark of special despair
and among the vomit of the rejected takes his last steps
to deliver to death a drop of splendour
of humanity, of truth.

[...]

Remember, God, these disobedient servants
to the laws of the herd
do not forget their face
that after so much wandering
it' s only right that luck may help them.


As an oversight
like an anomaly
like a distraction
like a duty.


 by "Immese prayer" 
 (it's a free adaptation of the Saga of “Maqroll - the Topman” by Alvaro Mutis,
 published by Einaudi of Turin)
 F. De André | I. Fossati | F. De André | I. Fossati | A. Mutis
Marina Galici - 3-cara-di-mineo.jpg

C.A.R.A. in Mineo(CT), Sicily - Italy - 2011

"Immense prayer" was not born as a photographic project, but as an attempt to respond to my offended humanity, trampled upon, narcotized by the media, by politics, by the repercussions of the economic-political duel between states.

A grave social phenomenon, that of mass immigration, trivialized on a par with any natural phenomenon, like a storm, a tidal wave, an onslaught of locusts; something that instils terror but towards which one cannot humanly act, indeed, renouncing a feeling of humanity paradoxically becomes a way of salvation.


Daily, the news broadcasts reported of sunken barges, of dead and missing people in the seawaters of the Mediterranean between one news item on economic policy and another on fashion, as if everything was normal, as if we, passive listeners, were to record it as 'normal'.

So I, one fine day, decided that I had to touch this very sore through their faces, through the bodies of the survivors.

The images that I share were taken from visits to the C.A.R.A. in Salinagrande (TP) and Mineo (CT) in Sicily in 2011.

The title "Immense Prayer", instead, comes from a song by the singer-songwriter Fabrizio De André, from which I have also extracted some extracts. Because these faces, these gazes that have defied death, are and are worth as much as a prayer, not towards a God of Heaven but rather towards our own humanity on Earth, which urgently needs to be invoked, reawakened.

Sarah Anderson