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The invitation to make a tour of a factory for watches changed my artistic career. Much to my surprise Mr. G.'s factory is covered with calendars and posters of tulips and bulb fields. When I ask around, employees tell me in a somewhat embarrassed manner that the director's wife is Dutch and that she had hung these posters. Posing the question whether they like these pictures, I barely get an answer. It eventually becomes clear that they have no choice in this matter, and nobody ever asks them anything about it.
It is even more disheartened when I find out that at the end of every year all non-Swiss employees get fired and have to leave the country. Many of them are from Italy or Spain. With each New Year they have to apply again
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for their previous job. Voiceless people working very hard, always afraid that something bad is looming. I decide to make a photo-reportage on this watch factory. I receive permission to take photographs and Kodachrome slides of every employee of the watch factory and I am able to walk around and communicate with these people for several days.
The world of the watchmakers is not so very different from the world of the artists: personal interests and motivations guide our behaviours; more often than not ignoring others in our grabbing the best opportunity for ourselves. We need to try to overcome the obstacle of unconquered i-ness and break through our own barriers in order to evolve as human beings. |
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